Better Out Than In
by Mardy Lass
Summary: SPOILERS for season 5: now that was unexpected! Set immediately after season THREE finale. Completely AU, as if seasons 4 and 5 never happened. Dean finds his way back to his family. Or does he? Rated T for language and if we're lucky, bloody fights!
1. Don't Go That Way! Never Go That Way!

**Better Out Than In**

**Author's Note:**

_I completed chapters one and two after the s3 finale aired (way back in the mists of time) and the awful hiatus that followed, but the story as it was got backed up, saved, and was never finished. Found it the other day, dusted it off, and decided to finish it. Ooh, that's a nice path, let's see where it goes, shall we?_

.

* * *

.

**ONE**

**Don't Go That Way - **_**Never**_** Go That Way!**

.

Dean patted at his t-shirt urgently, finding it free of blood, rips, tears and in fact any sign of Hellhound abuse whatsoever. He blinked, looking up the vast open space in front of him. Everything appeared to be a dull orange colour. There was no sun in the sky and yet everything had tiny, ominous shadows.

It clicked.

"So this is Hell," he mused, looking around the wind-swept, barren rock.

The shorter girl at his side, her long red hair blowing around her, put her hands behind her back slowly. "It is for you," she shrugged.

He jumped slightly and looked down at her. "And who are you? The doorman?"

"Kind of," she allowed with a smile.

He studied her for a moment before looking back out at the scenery. "Why does it look like a scene from _South Park_?" he asked, confused. "Aren't there supposed to be like nine circles or something? Screaming, flames, torture, yadda yadda yadda?"

She smiled. "Oh, we don't need that. You'll see," she said smugly.

"What's that smell?" he asked, putting the back of his hand to his nose and trying to breathe in something that didn't try to strip the organs from his insides.

"Hell," she shrugged.

He turned and looked at her. "So we get to keep what we look like?"

"Yeah," she smiled. "Think of it as a nasty kind of _Matrix_."

"Oh you mean part two? Well I managed to get through that pile of bullcrap, so this should be a walk in the park," Dean snorted. She smiled, but said nothing.

He turned and looked out over the view, something nudging at him to take notice, but he just couldn't take it in. One minute he had been looking at Sam and giving him his best confident smile, squeezing his shoulder and telling him to look after the Impala, to carry on like the wayward son he'd always taken him for, and the next minute he had been shredded quite painfully by Hellhounds. He had screwed his eyes shut, determined to go out like a man - but it had hurt so _much_, and not just physically. Then he had opened his eyes and found himself here.

'Here' was a rock plateau, dark red and warm, small spirals of steam appearing every now and again from around him. More rocky outcroppings splayed about them in strange patterns, warm air draughts busying around them.

"So… where's the big guy?" Dean asked gingerly. He noticed for the first time that his jacket and heavy shirt appeared to have lost their way on his journey down here. He put his hands to his t-shirt again, pressing at his front to confirm his earlier discovery that he was no longer in ribbons. The warm air slid over his bare elbows slowly, tickling and making him shiver despite the rather pleasant temperature.

"Who?" the girl asked, interested.

Dean looked at her. "The guy that runs the place," he said deliberately slowly. She smiled.

"Oh he's not here. No-one's actually seen him - but you know that, right? So let me make one thing clear for you - just cos the boss isn't here, doesn't mean the inmates can raise Hell. Well, not in our sense, anyway."

"Right," Dean replied flatly, looking back out over the huge landscape, apparently endless. "Let me get this straight - the boss is out to lunch and yet there's some kind of command structure anyway."

"Whoever told you that?" she giggled, and he looked at her, non-plussed. "There's no-one in charge down here, Dean. No-one and nothing. That's why…" She wandered closer to the edge of the rock, nodding down at the precipice. He walked up next to her and looked down.

Bodies, hundreds of bodies, all crawling, struggling, fighting, tumbling over each other… Screaming and shouting, baying and snarling… Women, men, little boys, smaller girls… All of them desperate to break free of the crowd and get purchase against the slippery wall of a pit.

Dean swallowed and looked up again.

"That's why no-one escapes. Well, unless they're particularly adept at fitting in here. There are ways to find a small crack, ways to beat the traffic and find an off-ramp that no-one else knows about," she smiled.

"Uh-huh," Dean said non-commitedly, looking back down again. "And what's your job in all this?"

"I smooth your transition to your place in the struggle," she smiled, looking over the edge.

_You mean you make sure I start at the bottom of that pile down there,_ he realised. "Think you've done your job, lady," he said firmly, as she turned to look at him with a supercilious expression that grated on his nerves. "Thanks for your help. Don't let the door bang your ass on the way out."

And he put a hand out and shoved.

She gave a shriek as she slipped off the edge and tumbled over the side. She grabbed at the edge and managed to get a hold with both hands.

"You can't do this!" she spluttered.

The silhouetted figure she knew to be Dean Winchester looked down from his much higher vantagepoint, his head tilted slightly in what she took to be amusement in her frightened state.

"Really? You said there was no command structure," he said flatly, "so you're no higher than I am, bitch. And with you down there, I'm free to find my little off-ramp. Be seeing you." He began to turn away.

"Wait!" she called desperately. One hand pulled free and she whimpered suddenly. "Wait! Dean!"

"What?" he asked harshly, turning to look down at her.

"This isn't fair! You can't just push me off like this!"

His face melted into rage so fast she reflexively gripped the edge much, much more tightly.

"You want to talk about _fair_?" he accused, pointing at her with venom. "I ain't supposed to be here! After the crap I've been killing, stabbing or torching for how many years I do _not_ deserve this place! I wasn't even supposed to be dealing with you black-hearted skanks but you left me no choice! So don't you _dare_ tell me what's fair and what's not, when you people put me down here in the first place! You got a problem with that? You take it up with Azazel! Oh, I forgot, you can't, cos I _friggin' shot him_. Any other gripes you got?" he demanded at full volume.

He narrowed his eyes at her, and suddenly the look in his dark green gaze chilled her all over.

"Wait! Please! What if I - what if I helped you!" she cried.

"How?" he scoffed.

"I can – I can help you stay ahead of the pack! More of my kind will come for you, to push you off to start your struggle!"

"How many?"

"Endless!"

"Then how do I get back out?"

"I can't - can't--"

"Then you're not part of the solution, you're just part of the problem." He turned away again.

"The door!" she called quickly, her hand sliding slightly. She yelped in fear. "The door you can't see! That's where you can get out," she squealed.

He kept his back to her. "Thanks," he said, blinking in surprise.

"So get me up!" she cried.

"Why would I do that?"

"Because we could be on the same side!"

"Never," he growled through gritted teeth. He turned back to her and slammed his boot down on her hand.

She screamed and her hand came away from the rock. She plummeted the steep fall. He looked away quickly before he could watch her connect with the mass of writhing people underneath. He heard her screams and shivered, turning away from the edge quickly.

He closed his eyes, remembering the small flash of inspiration that had strengthened him enough to go through with pushing her off and finishing the job: _Her or Sammy. Her or Sammy._

He repeated it to himself as he backed away from the edge, and then a new mantra entered his head.

'_So close, no matter how far, couldn't be much more from the heart. Forever trusting who we are __and nothing else matters_.'

.

* * *

.

"Hey Sam," Bobby said cheerfully, walking in the motel room and plonking the paper bag down on the wooden table under the window. "You still cleaning?"

Sam didn't look up from his bed in the small room, his hands working away with the guns and cleaning rags masterfully.

"Yeah," he said faintly.

"That's, ah… good," Bobby said, nodding. His face fell as he watched the young man focus all his attention on the nickel-plated Colt 1911 currently in pieces in his hands and over his knee. "Look, ah…" He paused, frowning in upset. "Look, Sam… Put that down. Please."

Sam, with the longest, shaggiest hair Bobby had ever seen him sport and a chin so unshaven it would have put the fear of mortality into an entire box of matches, simply put the rag and pieces down, looking up at Bobby slowly.

"You ok?" the last surviving Winchester asked innocently. "You look tired."

"I am, son. I am," Bobby admitted, walking to the other bed and sitting wearily. "Look… I know you're probably wondering… I said I wouldn't get in your way, these past six months. And… and I know you've done really well, going through that whole gang of demons by yourself like that. But there are loads more still to bag and tag, and… look, I'd like to hang around, if that's ok with you. I just think there's safety in numbers, is all." He clasped his hands together and waited.

"Safety in numbers?" Sam asked slowly, his voice dull.

"Just that. Knowing you've got my back, and I've got yours," he said firmly.

Sam looked at him for a long moment, and Bobby feared he was about to start shouting and swinging again. Sam had done a lot of that in the last six months. The six months after his brother had smiled and told him to be strong. The six months after Sam had had his heart broken in the worst way.

"Sure," he said lamely. "If you want."

Then he bowed his head, his opera house curtains of brown obscuring his face admirably, and went back to cleaning his late brother's favourite handgun.

.

* * *

.

Dean had no idea how long he'd been climbing, how long he'd walked and slipped, jumped and stretched, scrabbled and wrenched himself up cliff faces.

'_The door you can't see', she said. Well I'll be damned if I'm going to let her try and pull one over on me, the lying bitch. There's got to be a door or exit sign here somewhere, I've just got to find it._

He found a flat space beyond his incline and climbed onto it gratefully, panting hard and deciding here was as good a place as any for a re-con. He crouched quite comfortably, resting his forearms on his knees and his back against the rock wall. He got his breath back as he surveyed the scenery.

He let his eyes wander over the vista, thinking not for the first time that it was decidedly laughable without any flames. He turned his head, his vision gradually sweeping over the expanse in front of him with such attention to detail it could have been a Ridley Scott production. Then he blinked, his head tilting as he stared at a singular patch of rock off to his left. He covered one eye and looked again. He transferred his palm to his opposite eye, blinking ostensibly at the area of rock in confusion.

_The door you can't--_

"Wow, you've done well," said a loud voice.

"Thanks," he said cheerfully, getting to his feet and looking straight ahead to see a squat, thickly-built older man watching him with his arms folded. "Come to wave me off?"

"Just where do you think you're going?" the man asked. He blinked, his eyes black marbles of intent.

"Wherever I want, pal, wherever I want," Dean said smugly, his arrogance and bright smile making the man's arms loosen and fall to his sides.

"I don't think so. You'd have to get through me first."

"Yeah? Well I suppose I could spare you one minute of my precious time."

"Time - that's a good one," the demon said suddenly, flashing a smile.

"What?" Dean asked suspiciously.

"Time doesn't move much down here. Or it might move too fast, I can never tell," the man shrugged. "Doesn't make much difference unless you pop out into the real world one day. Which you aren't doing, cos you're never going to find the door," he added.

"Oh I've already found it," Dean said with a maddening smile.

"Really?" he scoffed, taking a step toward him.

Dean watched him, then moved slightly to his right to keep his distance, his eyes narrowing. "You've never seen it, have you?" he asked mildly.

"Me? Yeah, course I have," he said defensively, blinking his black eyes in defence.

"Nah - if you had, you wouldn't be here now," Dean pointed out. "You want to know where it is? We could both leave," he said slowly.

"Oh trust me, once you've left, you're not getting in again."

"Suits me," Dean shrugged.

The demon smiled, a small ripple of amusement at first, then it spread into a huge grin. "Oh really?" he asked. "That's what you say now. But it's all academic anyway - you're not leaving. Cos you don't know the way out."

"Sure I do - it's right there," Dean said easily, pointing to the thin air to his left.

The man looked over quickly, then shifted his gaze back to the quasi-human. "Nice try. There's nothing there."

Dean grinned. "Oh trust me, it's there. You're just not looking at it right," he said knowingly.

The demon fumed. "It doesn't matter what you think you can see - you're not getting past me."

Dean advanced on him quickly and the man put his hands up to defend himself. He made to grab at Dean's fist aimed at his head. So he caught the knee straight in the groin. He doubled, felt an almighty smash to his temple, and keeled over.

"Shame on you," Dean grinned, standing back and wiping his hands together. He chuckled loudly. "You're supposed to be a demon. Dude, you really ought to look into learning how not to get your ass kicked."

"You bastard!" the demon heaved, still squirming on the floor to get his breath back.

"Don't you--" Dean began, booting him in the face, sending him over backwards, "--dismiss my dad like that. He made me what I am."

The man coughed and spluttered, managing to writhe round to watch the younger man walk away from him.

"And what are you now, Dean? Have you looked recently!" he called after him with vitriol.

"Every damn day," he muttered to himself. "But what I am now is home free."

He stopped and looked at the thin air between him and the rock face. He put his hand out, turning his fingers to the left. They disappeared and he grinned. He spun his hand to the right again and they re-appeared.

"The old camouflaged-door-in-the-stone-wall trick, _Labyrinth_ style," he chuckled. "Mmm… Jennifer Connelly."

And then he walked round the wall.

And disappeared.

.

* * *

**So here we go, another one! :) If anyone gets where the chapter title comes from (which shouldn't be too hard!) I'll be smiling all week.**


	2. Hey! His Head Don't Come Off!

**TWO**

**Hey! His Head Don't Come Off!**

.

Sam tossed and turned, huffing to himself and then rolling onto his front. He grabbed his pillow and shoved it over his head, bending it over his ears desperately.

_So good of Bobby to stay, to share his snores with the entire motel,_ he thought angrily.

He let the pillow off his head and looked over at Bobby Singer, flat on his back and snoring for the US. He sighed, unable to stay angry.

_Then again, if he hadn't stayed, I might have gone nuts. These last few weeks with him have been… more normal than it's been. Since… Well, since._

"Sam? Sam, are you in here?" came a cautious voice in the darkness.

Sam twitched, his eyes peeling wide open in the blackness. He didn't dare answer.

"Come on, man, I can't see a damn thing in here. Jesus, is that Bobby?" the voice continued.

"And that's it," Sam sighed, sitting up slowly. "I knew it would happen, and now it has. I've totally lost my mind."

"Sammy!" the voice gasped in recognition.

Sam squeezed his eyes shut, drawing his knees up to his chest and putting his long arms round them. "I've lost my mind," he repeated to himself on a whisper. He started to hum '_Enter Sandman_', the lyrics having escaped him for the moment.

"Look, can we get some light in here?" the voice said harshly. "If I have to fall over one more - oh, screw this."

There was a snap as the lights blinked on.

Dean screwed his eyes up for a moment as he looked around, his hand falling from the light switch. "Finally," he said to himself, exasperated. "Sammy!"

Sam stared at the image of this brother, who looked amazingly healthy for a dead man, in the same jeans and single t-shirt that had haunted Sam's dreams for months.

"_Say your prayers little one, don't forget my son, to include everyone. Tuck you in, warm within, keep you free from sin till the sandman he comes… Sleep with one eye open, gripping your pillow tight_--" Sam gabbled desperately.

"Sam, it's me!" Dean said with a big grin.

"You're just a horrible dream," Sam pointed out carefully, shifting back in the bed. "Just a nasty, pain in the ass, guilty dream. Again."

Dean's grin faded. "No," he countered with deliberate patience, "I've spent God knows how long hiking my way out," he added, walking over toward him.

Sam's throat made a strangled sound as its owner hastily scooted back up against the headboard.

"Whoa whoa whoa," Dean said quickly, putting his hands up in a soothing gesture. "Slow down, dude. It really is me."

"N-no it's not," Sam stammered, his eyes wide, much like those of a bunny in the headlights.

Dean realised a noise had stopped. He looked over at the other bed. "Wasn't Bobby over--"

Something large and heavy swept into his head from behind and he crashed to the floor. He groaned and put a hand to his head slowly, feeling the cut and muttering to himself.

"Hey Bobby, nice shot," he managed, getting to his hands and knees to find Sam and Bobby staring at him.

"Dean?" Bobby gasped. "Is that _you_?"

"Yeah," he hissed in pain, sitting back on his heels and putting his hand to the back of his head again. He pulled it back to find it clean, but he had definitely felt the ridges of a cut. "What the hell did you hit me with, a two-by-four?"

Bobby showed him the handle of the Colt slowly, and he shrugged.

"Oh. Well at least you didn't shoot me with it," he allowed.

"What are you doing here?" Bobby cried.

"Bleeding, I think," Dean said, getting to his feet. "Although…" he began with doubt more than just a shade to his voice. He felt at the cut up area and found it to be magically healed. "Whoa - cool," he breathed, tilting his head to show the others. "Neat, huh?"

"Dean?" Sam whispered, swallowing some of his fright with a great big dollop of trepidation. He pushed himself off the bed and found his feet surprisingly solid.

Dean looked at him. "Hey Sam," he said, suddenly appearing nervous. "You ok?"

"Ah… no, not really," he shrugged, as if lost were something he wished he still were. "Are you really here, or is this a bad dream?"

"Still here, Sam," Bobby said pointedly, waving at him deliberately.

"Yeah, I'm really here," Dean shrugged, then his calm exterior broke and he grinned from ear to ear. "Took me a while, but I found me a back door."

Sam edged toward him, more nervous than an eaglet that has been told all it has to do is jump off the branch and flap. He put a hand up, hesitating before he flicked his gaze at his brother's face. Dean appeared confused, as if Sam's fear were about as expected as a tax rebate addressed to '_Dean Winchester Esquire, Vice President of The United States of America_'. Sam swallowed and allowed his palm to flatten against the t-shirt over Dean's shoulder. He breathed out finally, feeling the actual solidity of the brother, still watching him with abject bemusement. Dean put his arms out and grabbed Sam in a bear hug, crushing him effortlessly as he closed his eyes.

Bobby staggered back and landed on the bed heavily, unable to do anything but watch.

"Dean?" Sam whimpered. He raised his arms round his late brother and held onto him desperately. "Dean?"

"Yeah, it's me," he breathed, still squeezing his little brother as if he expected him to disappear at any moment. "_Man_, it's good to see you alive."

"I didn't forget you," Sam said in a small voice. "I didn't. I tried to find a –"

"Sammy, forget it," he interrupted, pulling him away by the shoulders and studying his face.

"I saved this for you," he managed. "I didn't want to bury it with you and let it rot." He pulled at his t-shirt, hoiking the amulet free on the cord. "I saved it it for you."

"And that's why I'll get you an extra cookie," Dean grinned, taking the leather cord from him and swinging the amulet from his fingers for a second. "Just don't feel right without this." He slipped it over his head, patting it against his lone t-shirt. "_Now_ I'm back." He looked up at Sam and Bobby, his hands out as if he were a display model. "Hah?"

"I didn't stop trying," Sam said urgently. "I didn't. I even tried--"

"Don't. Leave it. There was nothing you could do. I was on the other side, it was easy for me," Dean eased, waving a hand at him.

"Easy?" Bobby breathed, and Dean turned to look at him.

"Ah… simple," he corrected. "Not easy. As such."

"So… You were in Hell - and now you're out?" Sam asked. He stared, caught himself, and walked back up to his brother. He took his wrist, pressing. "You're really dead," he said, surprised.

"Ahm… yeah, I guess so," he said gingerly, an alarmed look crossing his face for the first time.

"No pulse… and no temperature at all… it's like… you're not made of… you're not made of human any more," Sam whispered, letting go of his wrist.

"What are you, five?" Dean teased with a smile that looked rather forced, but Sam started to smile too.

"So what happens now?" he asked.

Dean shrugged. "I have no idea. I guess someone's going to try and take me back. Or I'll fry up in the sun, or something."

"Not funny," Sam pouted pointedly, and Dean avoided his gaze. He looked around the room instead.

"Where's my car?"

"_My_ car is outside. She's washed and we just did an oil change yesterday," he added quietly, and Dean looked at him. "I guess you'll want her back?" he managed with a small smile.

"Thanks."

"Hey, it was that or buy a new one. And you didn't exactly leave behind a huge estate to be divided up," he smiled.

"True." He turned and looked at Bobby. "Ah… You ok?"

"Either I'm gonna hurl and get rid of this nasty dream I'm havin', or you're actually here," he allowed. "Tell me something."

"What?"

"You got no pulse, no body temperature, no signs of life."

"So I'm starting to notice."

"So how are you here, walking and talking?"

"No idea," Dean muttered. "Last thing I remember was getting shredded by Hellhounds. Then I wake up on this rock face with this demonic skank telling me she's going to smooth my transition into the horde."

"The horde?" Sam prompted.

"You don't want to know," Dean said dismissively. "So I started climbing. Found the exit and bam, here I am."

"Exit," Bobby prompted. "There's an exit?"

"Well… back door," Dean allowed. "Invisible back door."

"Does it get any more nuts than this?" Bobby groaned, sitting back down on the bed.

Dean looked at Sam, who just stared back at him.

"So… What do we do now?" Sam asked weakly. "I mean, Bobby and I… we buried you. You have a dead body in a coffin."

"Well I guess I got two now," Dean shrugged.

"What happens when the sun comes up?" Bobby asked quietly. "What happens to this new you now?"

"Like I know?" Dean asked, exasperated. "Look, I just climbed out of Hell, man! I was there for like… a few days, maybe not even that."

"A few _days_? Dean, it's been six months," Sam said clearly.

"Whatever. Point is, I'm out and I'm dead but I'm… walking around. Oh great," he tutted, wiping his face. "That makes me the walking dead!"

"We need to look into escaped souls," Sam said wisely.

"I'm not a soul, I'm… a - a corpse," Dean realised. "Aw crap - am I gonna start to rot?"

"You better not," Bobby grumped. "The minute you start to smell bad, I'm saltin' and burnin' you."

"Thanks," Dean grinned, suddenly amused. He looked back at Sam. "So… let's work out why I'm not all the way dead, then. And what we can do about that."

.

* * *

.

Sam tapped away at the keyboard, intensely studying every webpage. Bobby sat at the end of his bed, fingering the Colt Paterson gingerly, watching Dean.

Dean regarded him with just as much trepidation, and the two seasoned hunters could easily have entered into a staring competition.

"If you're gonna shoot me, just shoot me," Dean said quietly.

"I'll wait till you try and kill one of us, if that's ok," Bobby breathed in retaliation. "Or your eyes go black."

"Thanks," Dean winced. "Look, I feel the same. Even though I'm… Well, I'm _dead_. Everything's the same - except for the first time in history I am not thinking about ninja'ing Sam's coffee out from under him."

Sam turned in the chair, looking at them both. "Well… according to a few sources, you're not an escaped soul," he said slowly.

Bobby and Dean looked at him.

"Really? So what am I, a figment? I sure as Hell ain't a ghost, Sammy."

"Yeah, I know… There are rules apparently. You're not an escaped soul because if you were, you wouldn't be corporeal."

"Check out Mr Spock here," Dean sighed, wiping his face over slowly. "Look - what am I classed as? That's all I want to know."

"As far as I can figure it… you're a detainee who got out before you could be properly added into whatever Hell-prison exists," he shrugged.

"So why am I dead? Why am I not in a million ribbons? Why do I have a body?" Dean pressed. "And why's it not hungry or cold or…" His face drained of all colour, in an ironic display of cold fear. "Holy crap - I haven't thought about a girl in over ten minutes! Oh _please_ tell me I'm not a Ken doll now!"

Somewhere beneath the hopeful daze that had descended upon Sam, his subconscious was busy hoping to God that, one, he existed so that, two, he could be relied upon to keep his apparently undead brother around. Any and all of Dean's comments - that should have propelled Sam's face, kicking and screaming, into reactions happy or otherwise, were simply being treated as possible vicious lies told him by his wishful thinking.

However, he forced himself to surface from the mire of not wanting to wake up just in case it would cause his brother to disappear. "Look, give me some more time here. This is… not exactly a documented event," he said out loud. "I'm having to look in grimoires and ancient texts. It's not easy."

"Yeah, alright," Dean allowed, shaking his head. He looked up again at Bobby. "You want to try shooting me anyway?"

"Dean," Bobby tutted.

"Well if you hit me in the knee and I don't die, then I'm not a demon. I won't die from a leg wound." He paused. "I won't die _again_," he amended. "And you saw how that crack in my head sealed up after you whacked me with the damn gun."

"Yeah," Bobby said curiously. "Didn't that hurt?"

"Of course it hurt!" Dean scoffed. "Just… felt like it wasn't… serious. Like it didn't matter."

"What the Hell does that mean?" Bobby pressed.

"I don't know, ok?" he snapped, and the older Singer recognised more than a little disquiet in the younger man's tone.

He sat back, putting the gun down on the bedspread next to him. "Well it's getting up to dawn. What do we do, sit and stare at him? I ain't clapping my hands to save him when the sunlight hits him."

"We wait and see," Sam muttered.

Bobby looked at Dean. "Well I'm hungry. You?"

Dean's face turned piteous. "I guess not," he admitted miserably. "So while we're all waiting for me to turn demon and start twisting people's heads off, why don't you fill me in on what's happened in the last… what was it? Three months?"

"Six," Sam put in.

"Let's do this one step at a time," Bobby said overly politely.

He leaned back to the duffle on the bed behind him, fishing around until he produced a tin can. He unscrewed the lid slowly, eyeing Dean. He got up and faced Dean expectantly.

"What?" Dean asked innocently.

"Well stick your hand in the salt, ya ijit!"

Dean got up and looked at the older man's hand with worry. He sniffed, hesitating before stretching a hand out and taking the salt can. He shook some into his hand. Nothing happened and Dean handed the can back, scrubbing the salt around a little with his finger, apparently in relief.

Bobby bent down to tip salt round Dean's feet in a small circle. He straightened up again and gestured to it with his head. "Right. Now step over the line, boy," he commanded.

Dean straightened his back and stepped over the line of salt without flinching. His second boot came down more or less next to the pioneer and the two men looked at each other.

"So salt don't harm you," Bobby surmised.

"Holy water," Dean said immediately, gesturing with his head.

Bobby turned back to the duffle, replacing the salt and pulling out a small silver flask. He tossed it at Dean, who caught it easily.

"And silver's a no-go," Bobby commented.

Dean just huffed through his nose, unscrewing the lid and taking a swig of water. "And so's holy water," he shrugged, putting the lid back on and handing the flask back to the older man.

Bobby took off his cap, smoothing a hand over his head. "Sam? Ideas?" he asked.

Dean put a hand up suddenly, his face pained. He spluttered, his face turning red. Sam got to his feet and backed away. Bobby snatched up the Colt as Sam plastered himself against the wall.

Dean coughed and gagged, clawing at his throat. Bobby cocked the pistol. Sam stared. The choking and spluttering was cruel to watch but they couldn't look away. It was a good minute of Dean hacking and desperate gagging until Sam realised his brother wasn't actually breathing.

Dean's head flipped back. A huge rictus of effort went through his torso.

Bobby lifted the gun. He aimed.

And then a mouthful of water spat itself up and out of the dead Winchester.

Dean's legs lost their strength and he collapsed to the floor, shivering in perhaps disgust or shock.

Bobby just watched him, eyes wide, gun aimed at his head. Dean leaned on the bed behind him, his face a picture of exhaustion and pain.

"D-Dean?" Sam managed quietly.

"That was definitely better out than in," he groaned, a hand to his ribs. "Guess I shouldn't drink stuff."

"You think it was the holy water?" Sam breathed from the corner of his mouth.

Bobby blinked at him, then Dean. He kept the gun on him, cocked and ready. "Like I know?" he growled.

The two hunters watched the apparently dead man get his equilibrium back. He swallowed a few times and then put his hand to the bed behind him, getting up slowly and sitting. He scrubbed his hand through his hair and looked up at the pair of them.

"Well it didn't burn him," Sam added. "Maybe… maybe it's any liquid. Maybe he just can't drink _anything_."

"I _can_ hear you," Dean pointed out, seeming much more recovered.

Sam cleared his throat. "Yeah, um, sorry." He paused, then put his hand out and pushed the Colt down from its aim. Bobby looked at him, but Sam's eyebrows leapt on the older man's resolve and wrestled it into submission with hope and puppy eyes on their side. Bobby sighed and let the gun drop.

"We try an exorcism. If he survives that, he's not a demon," Sam nodded.

"Oh, nice work, Einstein," Dean accused shortly. "I ain't a demon! I'm just me! Dead! Or not all the way dead!"

"Dean - please," Sam said quickly, a hand up in surrender. "You want us to make sure, right?"

Dean looked at him for a long moment, then swung his head to regard Bobby with a calculating look.

"It's ok for you guys - you just want to make sure I'm not going to get black eyes or munch on your brains or - or - or drink your blood or start ripping limbs off. But I'm totally freaked out here - I'm friggin' bricking it! I want to know what's happened to me. So yeah, do your tests and your exorcisms and whatevers - just find out what's been done to me!"

Sam sighed quietly. He looked at Bobby. "Exorcism," he judged.

"I'll get my book," Bobby nodded.

.

* * *

_**Guess the chapter title origins, get cyber-cookies. :)**_


	3. Eject! Eject!

**THREE**

**Eject! Eject!**

.

Dean sat on the bed and listened impatiently to three different exorcisms, read quite nervously by his baby brother, in three different languages. He waited until both Bobby and Sam were done nicking him with silver and iron, making him lick devil's shoestring, wolf's bane, and even garlic.

"Alright! Enough!" he cried, as Bobby muttered something about earthly poisons. He stood abruptly, making the other two men back away. "Oh for--. Look, whatever I am now, I ain't here to hurt you two, alright? So just calm the Hell down and stop leaping for cover every time I move!"

Bobby straightened up, pinning the supposedly dead man with a hard gaze. "So we're just supposed to trust you, now?" he accused.

"Well I'm sitting here trusting you two not to start cutting me into small pieces so I can be carbon-dated!" he shot back. "Anything else you want a sample of? Don't ask me to pee in a cup, I don't think that works any more!"

He turned away from them in apparent disgust, and Sam cleared his throat quietly. He stepped around Bobby slowly, approaching his brother with trepidation.

"Dean," he said quietly. "You know we have to check, right?"

"I know!" Dean cried, frustrated. "I know! But I'm kinda struggling with the whole 'I ain't got no pulse' thing here, alright? You two think _you've_ got problems! I'm _dead_!" He put a hand out to the rickety wooden dresser by the bed and shoved everything off in a flurry of unleashed anger. "I'm dead! I got no heartbeat, no breathing, no pulse, no food, no drink, no _nothing_! So screw you two and your panties in a twist over me coming back from Hell! I got bigger problems!" He put his hands on the empty dresser, leaning on them.

Sam backed up a step. "We just need to know--"

"It's _me_, Sam!" Dean interrupted with hurt, whirling on him so fast Sam's eyes could not follow. One moment Dean was glaring his best accusatory green at the offending table, the next he was facing his brother square-on, as if the movement in between never happened. He jabbed a finger into his own t-shirt. "It's just _me_!"

The injured tone caught Sam off-guard and he let his arm lift of its own accord. His hand landed on his brother's shoulder and he squeezed slightly.

"Ok, alright," he said soothingly. "Just… Alright."

Dean looked at him for a long moment, his eyes turning less tortured and more ashamed. He let his head drop as he flicked his hand up, attempting to knock Sam's from him. "Get off me, man," he mumbled. "You might catch somethin'."

But Sam kept hold of him, anchoring him to the spot. Dean kept his gaze on the carpet to the side.

"Dean, just slow down," Sam said quietly. "Bobby and I… we buried you. We thought you were dead. Then you appear in the room and start doing all these dead-man tricks… We're just as shocked as you are. Maybe more, seeing as we never expected to see you again. Especially not walking around like a bear with a sore head." He let a small smile tug at his lips as he shook his hand slightly. Dean managed to look up at him. "Then again, if you _hadn't_ been so pissed we might not have believed it's really you."

"Yeah," he muttered, looking away again.

Sam blinked, his face falling in alarm. "Dean?" he said crisply, spooked.

Bobby stiffened at his tone of voice and took a step closer, feeling for the gun in his jacket pocket.

"Dean, look at me," Sam commanded.

His brother turned his head and met his brother's gaze with fear. "Oh God, what is it?" Dean demanded. "Is my face peeling off? Am I starting to rot? What? What?"

"No… Nothing like that," Sam managed. He let his hand drop from his shoulder, before peering into his eyes. "It's just… Bobby?"

"What now?" the older Singer asked, a hand on the butt of the gun in his pocket. He came closer, and Dean broke off his worried stare to look at him.

"What? What are you looking at?" he asked, starting to panic. "What!"

"Eyes," Sam said clearly. "Look at his eyes."

"What _about_ my eyes!" Dean cried in fear. "What?"

"Just stay still, you big girl," Bobby snapped, his large hand clapping onto the left side of Dean's face. "Quite whining. Let me see."

Dean stared back at him, keenly aware of the weight of Bobby's hand against his skin. He swallowed and waited, eyes wide in fear of what the older man might say next.

"Never seen anything like it," he grumped, but he didn't seem particularly upset.

"Like what? Never seen anything like _what_?" Dean demanded. "What are they, black? Red? _Yellow_?"

"None of the above," Sam said with a knowing smile. Bobby patted at Dean's face once before letting his hand drop. Sam stooped and peered at the eyes causing so much hoohah. "They're kind of… Well they're still mostly green," he said, in a pre-occupied tone. "But it's the weirdest thing - the pupils aren't black."

"What? Well what are they?"

"They're… not. They're just… not there," Sam shrugged. "It's weird - it's like I should be able to see right through your head cos there's nothing there. There's like a hole. But… it's like the holes are in a room and someone's turned the lights out. I can't see far back enough to see what's there."

His face loomed closer and closer to Dean's until his nose nearly touched his brother's cheek.

"Get away from me," Dean protested with an angry snort, shoving him backwards. Sam rocked back on his heels, straightening up. "So what does that prove, anyway? What am I?"

Bobby backed away to a chair and sat down. "Something new," he shrugged.

Dean huffed and reached for the coffee cup by Sam's bed. "All I can taste is poisons and herbs. Ugh - this taste is never going away, and it definitely ain't minty," he grumbled. "You two better figure out exactly what I am and how to reverse it." He lifted the cup and tipped the contents into his mouth, swallowing it in a rush. "_Ngoh_ - that's better," he sighed.

Sam and Bobby exchanged a glance. Dean set the cup down again, blowing out a long sigh.

"So what do we do now? There must be a way to reverse this, right? I mean, I don't want to be--"

He stopped suddenly, choking. He spluttered and hacked, a hand to his throat. He put a hand out to the wall to steady him. The choking got worse until a huge wave of effort and what appeared to be painful compression went through the Winchester.

Sam and Bobby got clear just in time as the contents of the cup came shooting up in a fine spray, leaping from Dean's throat without even acknowledging his mouth. Dean dropped straight to the carpet on his knees. He looked for all the world like he had no clue where the last two seconds had gone.

He groaned for a moment before leaning forward and putting his hands to the carpet. He cleared his throat and looked up at the two men watching him.

"Let's not try that again," he said weakly.

"What the Hell was that?" Bobby demanded. "You gonna do this every time you eat or drink?"

"How the Hell should I know?" Dean managed, looking much recovered from his unplanned Etna manoeuvre. He got to his feet and dusted his single t-shirt off, noting the coffee patterns around him on the carpet. "Oops."

"Yeah. Let's _not_ try that again," Sam confirmed, wiping wayward coffee from his face.

"Ah-huh. Yeah. Sorry dude," Dean managed. He sniffed and rubbed the back of his neck slowly. "So… Get to it, Sam. Find some lore, some legend, some_thing_ that explains all this."

"I'll try," he sighed, turning back to the laptop under the window.

"And you," Bobby said tersely, pointing at Dean, "can sit the Hell down and shut up while I tell you what's been going on these past six months."

"Ok," Dean allowed, doing just that.

.

* * *

.

Sam leaned back from the laptop, scrubbing hands at his face and moaning at the lethargy attacking his brain with big pointy sticks.

"--So the chick just turns round to me and says, 'Oh, _tickle_! I thought you said 'pickle'!'" came Dean's very much amused voice.

Bobby tutted and groaned from his very comfortable position on the bed. "You're a monster," he concluded, but there was a very, _very_ slight look of amusement hiding under his beard.

"Hey, _she_ brought the pickle. I had no idea she was into that," Dean shrugged, happily cleaning the Colt Paterson without actually concentrating on it.

Sam turned in his chair. "Bad news, fellas," he announced wearily.

"What?" Dean asked immediately. "How long have I got before I start melting, or rotting, or fading out or something?"

"No idea. Truth? There has never been anything like you recorded in any language since people learned to make records," he sighed.

"Or just learned how to put them on the internet," Bobby pointed out.

Sam turned to sit sideways on the chair, lacing tired hands over the backrest and shaking his head. "I've had messages from a couple of professors, too. They think I'm mixing up a few legends and researching the wrong thing, because no one thing exists like the being I'm describing."

"The being? I'm a _being_, now?" Dean accused.

"You prefer zombie? Or corpse?" Bobby interrupted. "Just shut your yap for a moment, let the boy speak."

Sam shot his brother an amused look. Dean scowled back at him but said nothing more.

"Anyways. Can't find anything at all. The best idea I got is just… nuts," Sam admitted.

"What? What idea?" Dean demanded eagerly. "Anything, Sammy, come on."

Sam blew out a long sigh. "Well you're not dead, right? At least, your body kind of is, but it's not decomposing or doing the zombie deterioration thing."

"Right."

"But you're still alive in there. Right?"

"Oh yeah."

"Well maybe… maybe that's not the real you. Maybe you think that's the real you, but it's not your body."

Dean thought for a long second. "That's what you come back with? Me spitting coffee, healing my own head wounds, having black holes for eyes, and _that's_ what you come back with?" he accused.

Sam lifted his hands in surrender. "I don't see you coming up with anything."

Dean tutted, dropping the cleaning rag and the Colt to the bed next to him. "Then we go find out. Where was I buried?"

"Pontiac."

"You buried me in a _car_?"

"Illinois!" Bobby snapped. "Come on then, smart-ass, let's get to Illinois and dig you up. But if you _are_ still in the box when we open it, I have no idea what we do next."

"Me either," the two boys muttered. They shared a knowing glance before getting to their respective feet.

.

* * *

.

Dean's hands were tight on the wheel as the Impala rumbled along in the early afternoon sun. He passed the road sign and sighed, the knowledge they still had a few hundred miles to go not easing his discomfort.

He looked to his right at Sam as he slept soundly with his head cushioned on a jacket against the window. He realised he was staring and pulled his gaze back to the road.

_Six months_, he thought resentfully. _Six months. That demon wasn't lying - time really does go differently here._ He blinked, wondering why he now considered his car, his family, his _life_ 'here', as if there were now somewhere to which it were different. His eyes flicked up and he caught sight of Bobby also out for the count, ensconced in the corner of the back seat. _Maybe it's a good thing I don't seem to need to sleep_.

He took a hand off the wheel, running it through his hair and letting the elbow lean on the window block. His fingers traced along the lining of the window seal above him, and he let himself be comforted by the fact that he could still feel a connection to the car under his touch. He realised that, while the glass was cool against the back of his forearm, it wasn't enough to make him chill. He considered the fact that he had gone all night and most of the morning without a thought to a shirt or jacket and then dismissed it as irrelevant.

_If I felt the cold, which obviously I don't any more, I'd bother one of them for a shirt. Bet they threw my stuff out, anyway._

Looking down at the radio, again he floundered as he realised he had no idea how to work it. Some kind of power supply lead was plugged into the cigarette lighter and a large rectangular flat slab was cradled in a black support slot, jury-rigged to hang in front of the old cassette player. Dean put his hand out to push it aside but found the flap over the tape slot seemed to be missing. In fact, the tape slot had been replaced with a blank fascia.

Dean huffed to himself for the fiftieth time before putting his left hand back to the steering wheel. He leaned his right hand out to slap his brother's knee.

He paused, drawing his hand back and looking at him.

_I never seen him so… _used_. I don't think he's skipped a shave in years, and yet here he is looking like a contestant on Survivor._ He sniffed to himself, smiling over the childish thought that sneaked into his brain, concerning a large pair of scissors and Sam's currently straggly, unnecessarily long hair while he slept, but he managed to dismiss it as less than a priority right now. _I can wait till this is fixed. Then he is so getting a Grade One, Marine style._ He looked back at him and it struck him how deeply asleep the lanky brother was. Abruptly he appreciated how much his baby brother apparently needed the rest he was getting, and he let his head tilt back to the road. He put both hands on the wheel, resigned himself to the rattles and squeaks of the moving classic, and watched the road ahead.

Suddenly the empty road and the silence of the car was the loneliest thing he had ever encountered.

_It's like I'm the only person alive out here,_ he thought. _But I'm not even that, am I? So what am I? What am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to do?_

He swallowed an unforeseen lump in his throat over his whole predicament and then cleared it noisily, as if to remind himself he were still capable of sound.

Presently, he began to hum.

The Impala rumbled on.

.

* * *

_And as it's my birthday 18th Jan, you get a double whammy of two chapters today. See? I can share. :)_

**_Thanks for reading, everyone! Reviews are love, and you lot certainly deliver. _**


	4. Give Her A Hand

**FOUR**

**Give Her A Hand**

.

Bobby lifted his shovel, standing back and looking at Sam and Dean. "This is a young man's game," he wheezed, tossing the shovel up and out of the hole, climbing out slowly.

"Then Sam can finish this," Dean retorted. "I'm supposed to be dead, right?"

"Can it, wise-ass," Bobby grumped. "Hurry up and dig out your goddamn coffin so we can check if you're in it."

"That has got to be the weirdest thing you've ever said," Dean smiled, shaking his head as he continued to dig.

Sam slammed the shovel into the dirt and heard wood. "Got it!" he announced. He began scraping until he found the lid of the coffin. Dean moved round and helped him until they had an outline of the lid.

"Pine," Dean observed. "Nice."

"And easily burnt," Bobby put in. Dean looked up at him. "If we needed to."

"Thanks," Dean winced, turning back to the coffin. "Right, we ready? Sam. Open it."

"You open it," Sam shot back. "It's _your_ coffin."

"I am not opening that and finding dead me covered in worms looking back at me!" he countered. "_You_ open it!"

"You do it!"

"You!"

"--Do it!"

"Boys!" Bobby cried in anger. "Get out of the way, you simpering cheerleaders, and _I'll_ do it!" He slid down into the grave, shoving the boys aside. He knelt down and found the side, snatching Sam's shovel from him and jamming it into the wood. "Well get off then!"

Sam and Dean exchanged a look before they scrambled up and out of the grave. There were the sounds of wood snapping, and some cursing, and then Bobby froze.

"Well I'll be--." He cleared his throat, shaking his head as he bent down over the hole he had made.

"What?" Dean called eagerly. "What is it? Is it me? Dead me?"

Bobby sat back on his heels, exposing the hole he had made. Sam and Dean peered down quickly.

"It's… empty," Sam managed.

"Thank you, Captain Obvious," Dean snapped, sliding down into the grave. Bobby got up and backed away, standing over where the occupant of the coffin's feet should have been. He watched Dean kneel down and put his hands to the hole. He stuck his head right through, disappearing up to his shoulders, the seat of his jeans waving in the air as he studied whatever was inside the coffin.

"Well?" Sam asked quickly.

"Well… yeah," Dean called, his voice booming deep within the box. "It's empty, alright."

"When you're done mooning me, you think we can get out of here?" Bobby asked. "It's giving me the creeps."

Dean pulled his head free and got to his feet, wiping his hands together. "You get up top. Sam, get down here," he ordered.

"Why?" Sam asked, already putting his palm out to help Bobby leave the hole.

"I want to check no-one's written something or done spell crap to the box," Dean said darkly.

"Good thinking, Batman," he nodded, jumping down into the grave.

.

* * *

.

Sam and Dean crawled out of the hole, turning to sit on the edge. They looked down at the coffin now splayed open beneath their dangling boots. Bobby handed Sam a small flask, which he took gratefully.

"Nothing?" Bobby hazarded. "No charms, spells, markings?"

"Nothing," Sam confirmed, taking a swig. He paused and felt Dean's hand take the flask off him. Dean lifted it to his mouth but Sam snatched it back quickly.

"Hey!" Dean protested.

"You want to Vesuvius it out again?" Sam asked flatly.

"Oh. Right," Dean nodded. "I keep forgetting," he added in a small voice.

Sam took in the little-boy-lost expression on his elder brother's face and cleared his throat. He looked away deliberately, nodding to the empty pine box beneath them. "So no-one's spelled your corpse. And this is your real body. How did you get it back?"

"Why don't you ask me something I _can_ answer?" Dean snapped abruptly, getting to his feet. "Like '_You're screwed, aren't you Dean?_', or '_You do realise this is irreversible, don't you Dean?_'," he hurled as he turned away to the car.

Bobby caught up with him and grabbed his elbow. Dean shook it free and Bobby put his hands up in surrender.

"Look, Dean - we hear you, ok? We're not exactly pleased about how this is turning out either."

"Oh yeah? Let's swap places, shall we? You can be the dead one and I'll be the one pretending to give a crap--"

Bobby's fist flew of its own accord. It slammed into Dean's face, sending him to the scratchy grass.

Sam jumped to his feet with a gasp, hurrying over, but he stopped as he realised Bobby was not readying himself for a fight.

"Now you listen to me, you ungrateful dick," Bobby growled, pointing down at Dean with anger. "We spent _months_ getting over you dying! _Months!_ Sam here damn-near threw himself off a cliff! I lost three months in a whiskey bottle, and it took everything we had to get back to being the working people you see here today!"

Dean, judiciously, opted to stay on the ground, one hand pressed to his jaw where he had been hit. He glowered up at the older man, but was abruptly uncomfortable to find Bobby's face, once red with anger, now included eyes that held far too much water for a normal day.

"And then you just re-appear as if nothing's happened and expect us to care _why_ you're here, when all we care about is that you _are_ here!" He pointed his finger at Dean menacingly, but his voice was thick with the struggle not to set his tears free. "So stop crying about the fact that you're not all the way dead! You're friggin' lucky you're even here, and we're friggin' lucky we got you back--!" Bobby stopped short, letting his finger drop. But his watery eyes still bored into Dean's, his mask of rage and upset still broadcasting more hurt than Dean could have imagined the older man to bear.

Sam stepped forward, putting his hand on Bobby's shoulder. The older Singer pushed it off, turning and stomping away without even a backward glance.

Sam looked down at Dean, but his hand was still pressed against his jaw as he watched Bobby walk off toward the Impala.

"Dude," Sam said quietly.

His brother's eyes skittered toward him but bottled it at the last minute and instead fixed themselves somewhere near Sam's knees. "What?" he managed, his voice quiet.

"Get up out of the dirt. We need to figure this thing out," Sam observed in a hushed tone.

Dean rubbed at his chin before sitting up. He rested his arms on his knees and Sam waited. It was quiet for a long, long moment, only the sound of the Impala's door squeaking open and closed reminding them that time was passing.

"Hey, ahm… You know - well you know I'm sorry, right?" Dean breathed eventually, tilting his head to squint up at his brother.

Sam shrugged, nodding slightly.

"For the whole deal, about dying, about… well, about being a dick since I've 'come back'." He sniffed to himself. "Just… It's just that… I saw you like a couple of days ago. We were in that room with Lilith, and then I was in Hell. And then I climbed out, and there you were. It's been like…" He looked around the grass, searching for something. "You know when you get in the car and I drive, and you fall asleep, and when you wake up we're there, but you got no idea how long the drive took?"

"Kinda," Sam managed. He crouched down slowly, resting his arms on his knees and regarding his brother from two feet away.

"Well it's like that. I saw you, I died. Then straight away I came back and I have no idea how much time has gone by without me. I don't even know the date."

"November. Seventeenth, to be exact."

"Year?"

"Still two thousand eight," Sam smiled.

Dean watched him for a moment. "I'm… trying, Sammy. I just… I just don't get what's happened - to me. I seen all kinds of whacked-out, freaky crap. But this? I'm just lost." He shook his head and Sam sighed with unease.

"We all are. At least we've all got that in common." He took a steadying breath. "We're kind of… _I'm_ glad you're back. It's been… hard," he managed.

Dean closed his eyes, wiping a hand over them and huffing. "So I hear." He paused, shaking his head. "So what do we do now? Can we find something to kill? I need something to work on, something to do. I can't just float around hoping you'll work out some way to bring me back to life."

"Dean," he said gently, and his brother pinned him with a look. "I think we have to seriously consider the idea that this really _is_ irreversible."

"When you say 'consider', you mean 'accept', right?" he dared.

Sam didn't say a word. But his eyebrows did.

Dean pouted out a ripple of a sigh and then shrugged. "Well then. Let's find something to kill. What's the worst that could happen, huh? I get bit by a vampire? A werewolf? Somehow I don't think that's going to affect me like it should."

Sam smiled suddenly. "You know, this whole not-really-dead thing could really be a boon," he offered. Then his face froze.

"Yeah, like--." Dean noticed his brother's face turn alarmed. "What? What have you thought of now?"

"A boon," Sam muttered, as if to himself. "A boon…" He tossed a look at his brother that spoke volumes. "Got an idea. Get up." He turned and hurried to the Impala. "I need my duffle, my laptop and a stable internet connection."

Dean looked around himself before climbing to his feet. He dusted himself free of soil and dirt, retrieving the three abandoned shovels and following him to the car.

.

* * *

.

Sam wrenched open the door to the motel, flinging his duffle down and rifling through it as fast as he could.

"You got something?" Bobby asked sarcastically.

"Think so," Sam managed over his shoulder, as Dean entered the room behind them. He closed the door slowly, watching his brother with apprehension.

"Well is it a good thing or a bad thing?" he dared.

"Don't know yet," Sam snapped, growling in impatience and simply upending the entire duffle. Clothes, weapons, notebooks, paperbacks and socks fell out in a jumble of his life, as the other two men just watched him.

"What's that smell?" Dean asked, wrinkling his nose at Sam's belongings.

There was a knock at the door. Sam dropped the duffle, spinning to look at it. Bobby and Dean exchanged a glance. The older man pulled the Colt free, producing another gun and tossing it at Dean. They began to edge toward the door.

"Yeah?" Dean called cheerfully.

"Room service," was the sunny reply.

"Uh - thanks, but we're all stocked up on towels here," Dean replied in a friendly voice.

"No, I don't think you are."

Dean put his hand out toward the doorknob.

The door was summarily booted inwards. Dean and Bobby fell back, guns aimed at the doorway.

A young woman, long, red hair swaying as she straightened up, put her hands on her hips.

"Hey, Dean," she said happily. "Remember me?"

Dean blinked. Again he saw the rocky outcroppings, the dusty ground, the horde of people screaming and struggling. He closed his eyes and when he opened them, all he saw was her.

"Yeah, I remember you," he ground out. "How'd you get out?"

Sam stepped closer, a book in his hand. "Demon?"

"Only if Hell has a bargain bin," Dean sneered.

"But you're the one on special," she grinned, walking deeper into the room. She looked at the floor, tutting. "Dear dear dear," she complained. "No devil's traps yet? You three are getting sloppy."

"What do you want?" Sam demanded, already flipping through the book to find an exorcism.

"Mmm - Dean back. I had him, and he got out. He's not allowed to get out," she said teasingly. "I think you three know that. So come on, Dean, let's blow this pop-stand."

She raised a hand. Bobby and Sam flew clean across the room. They smacked into the walls, sliding down with thumps. It wasn't until they regained their wits that they realised they were pinned down to the wall and carpet.

"Oh," the girl said suddenly, staring at Dean. "Uhm…"

"What, was I supposed to fly too?" Dean demanded. His head tilted suddenly. "You _tried_, right? It didn't work on me."

"Whatever. Come along, little doggy, time we were leaving." She waved a hand at him.

He waited, but nothing happened. He looked down at himself, then back at her. "You havin' a demonic power malfunction, sweetheart?"

She fumed and lifted both hands, splaying both palms at him. A giant whirlwind powered around the room. It lifted clothes, books, bedspreads, curtains. It rattled the windows, turned Sam's hair into a static afro of restyling. Furniture creaked, chairs slid across the carpet.

Abruptly it stopped.

Dean, still standing and looking for all the world like a dog who has just spent the last twenty miles hanging his head out of the window of a large truck going at speed, simply put a hand up. He ran it through his hair, causing the crop circles to lie down a little. "Careful, sweetheart. Took me all of ten minutes to get my hair like this."

She cursed and simply leapt at him. He lifted his arms to defend himself. They clashed. Sam and Bobby watched, horrified, as she grabbed Dean's chin and head. She twisted. A sharp crack echoed round the room.

"No!" Sam shouted thickly in desperation.

Dean dropped to the carpet. The young woman put her hands on her hips, staring at the remaining men.

"Now then," she began with an evil smile. "While his soul's on its way back to--"

"Ho-ly crap!" came Dean's angry shout. "That _really_ friggin' smarted!" He climbed to his feet behind her, using Sam's bed for purchase. He stood tall, turning his neck to make it click with a tiny sigh of comfort.

She turned on the spot, gasping in horror. "No!"

"Yeah," he growled.

She ran at him, screaming in fury. He simply reached out and turned. She was thrown to one side in his grasp. She tried to get a hold on him. He clamped a single hand round her throat.

"Immortal," she wheezed.

"What'd you say?" he demanded angrily.

She gulped and strained, clawing at his hand. "Let me - let me--"

"What did you _say_?" he shouted into her face.

She squeaked something and put her hand to the t-shirt at his shoulder, scrabbling for a hold. She tried unsuccessfully to weaken his grip somehow. He let his fingers open a crack and she dragged in breath.

"Immortal," she choked.

"Immortal? Me?" he demanded.

She struggled and wrenched. "I'll - make - make you - wish you _could_ - _die_!"

He just appraised her, realising she was a full demon unable to bring any of her dark powers to bear against him. He let his mouth drop open as he registered the fact that she was physically incapable of harming him.

Or stopping him.

She spat curses at him, flailing to get her nails into his eyes. She realised he was distracted. She switched tactics. She lifted her knee and drove it straight into his groin. He let go abruptly, dropping to his knees in pain.

"_Oomph_ - you _bitch!_" he accused.

She made for his face. His hand shot out and wrenched her arm down. He slammed his head into hers. She cried out and staggered back. He sprang to his feet as she turned on him.

He shoved a hand out. It went straight into her chest and didn't stop.

The next thing Sam registered seeing was black smoke flooding out, writhing and twisting as it covered the form of the girl. It fought and convulsed, Dean's arm halfway up to his elbow lost inside the tunnel of demon smoke - and presumably the girl.

Abruptly the smoke turned to fire. It flamed bright blue for less than a second. Then it was gone.

Dean stepped back, his hand falling to his side.

The woman, the human host, fell to the carpet apparently unscathed. Dean swallowed and just stared. Sam and Bobby realised they were free again. They scrambled to their feet but then slowed as their neared Dean, creeping closer. Sam crouched down and tested the girl for a pulse only to find it gone.

"Dead," he confirmed breathlessly. He looked her over carefully. "Think she had been for a while."

Dean lifted his hand and studied it, finding it clean, present and correct. He looked back at the corpse.

"She called you immortal," Bobby whispered to Dean.

"You killed a demon - you shoved your hand straight _inside her_ and _killed a demon_!" Sam managed hoarsely.

Dean looked back at his hand, turning it over as he studied it. "_Cool!_"

.


	5. Enter Man With Gun

**FIVE**

**Enter Man With Gun**

.

"Cool?" Bobby demanded, walking round in front of Dean and grabbing at his wrist. He pulled his hand up in between their eyes. "Cool? Son, you just killed a _demon_! Now how in the Hell did you do that?"

Dean just looked at his hand, then, slowly, his gaze crept up and latched onto Bobby.

"Jesus Christ!" Bobby blurted, alarmed. He let go of Dean's arm and stepped back one.

"What?" Sam asked hastily, getting to his feet. He stopped short as he caught sight of his elder brother's face.

"What?" Dean worried. "What are you looking at?"

Bobby and Sam exchanged a glance.

"What!" Dean demanded, now a picture of fright and horror.

Sam took a step closer, peering at him. "Your eyes," he said quietly. "They're…"

"What?" Dean demanded again. "They're what, Sammy? Don't say they're yellow!"

"No! No, they're not yellow," he said quickly, waving dismissive hands at his brother. "They're… like… The pupils aren't black holes any more - they're _silver_."

"Silver? Holy crap, are you kidding me?" Dean cried. He pushed his brother to one side and headed for the bathroom in the motel room. He wanged the door open and disappeared inside. "What the--. They're silver!" came his panicked voice.

Bobby swallowed and looked down at the dead girl on the carpet. "We got problems," he observed. "We have to get rid of her, and get him--" he said, jabbing his finger at the bathroom and the sounds of fretting going on within, "--calmed down."

"I heard that," Sam nodded, worried by the horrified protestations still emanating from behind the partly closed door. "You want the girl? I'll take Dean."

"Done. I don't want to have to plant one on him again." Bobby turned his attention to the girl as the taller man went to the bathroom door.

"Dean, we need the Impala keys," Sam called at the wood patiently.

"Silver! What the hell's happening to me, Sam? What is it?" he cried shakily.

Sam opened the door and grabbed his brother's shoulder. Dean flinched and tried to yank himself backwards, and Sam felt his arm shaking under his grip.

"G-Get off me," Dean managed, his voice jumping in either disgust or abject terror.

"Whoa - easy, man," Sam soothed, pulling him back toward him and grabbing his other shoulder in the hopes of steadying him. "C'mon, _easy_."

Dean put his hand to the bathroom counter to take his weight suddenly. Sam gripped his arm more tightly. "Careful," he urged, realising Dean was starting to sink.

"What is it?" Dean whispered, his face white with fear. "It ain't right, Sammy, it ain't right - _I'm_ not right!"

His brother put his other hand out and pushed Sam to one side, barrelling out of the smallest room. He made it about four steps beyond the door before he dropped.

Sam watched him crash to his knees. Dean simply toppled over and landed flat on his face, arms by his sides.

Sam hurried over, grabbing his brother's arm and rolling him onto his back. "Dean! Dean!" he cried, slapping at his face. He put his fingers to his neck but could feel no pulse.

"What are you looking for? He's _dead_," Bobby snapped. He crossed the carpet and knelt down, opening Dean's left eye. He looked in, finding the dead eye staring straight up. "Green on the outside, silver in the middle," he confirmed. He let the lid drop before putting the backs of his fingers to Dean's cheek firmly. Then he sat back, looking at Sam and resting an arm on his knee. "Well he ain't cold - he's still got no temperature."

Sam swallowed. "The demon called him immortal, right?" he reasoned hopefully.

Bobby nodded. "I heard her." He looked back down at Dean.

"So he's not _dead_-dead now, right? He's going to get up in a minute, right?" Sam begged. "Like he just did when that demon killed him. He's done it before so he can get up _again_, right? Right?" he pressed, grabbing Bobby's arm.

The older man put his hand on him and dragged him still, silencing him. "Sam - shut up. I don't know what to tell you - but I do know we have to keep calm," he urged. "So _keep friggin' calm_."

"Alright - alright," Sam breathed, nodding quickly. He tried to quell the shock and worry within, tried to slap a lid on it hastily. His subconscious leapt on the lid, weighing it down, and after a brief struggle with the contained feelings, it put its thumb up and indicated all was, if not calm, then definitely under control.

Bobby looked down at Dean, noting the healthy hue to his face even though there was no pulse, no sign of life whatsoever. "He just killed a _demon_, Sam. What is going on here?"

"I have no idea," Sam admitted, his voice weak and about as shaken as a vodka martini.

"Look, maybe it's just…" Bobby began. He ran out of words and regrouped. "Maybe killing demons wipes him out. Get him up."

Between them they hefted the apparently dead Winchester to the nearest bed, leaving him there on his back. They stood back and Sam closed his eyes quickly. Bobby put a hand on his shoulder.

"He may look dead, but you know he ain't. He's too stubborn to die now. Help me with this girl."

"Yes, Bobby," he whispered. He turned away and they went to the other corpse in the room.

.

* * *

.

Sam sat and stared, cradling the once-hot cup of coffee in his hands. Bobby sighed and turned off the TV, looking over at the Winchester apparently dead to the world in Sam's line of sight.

"Sam," he said pointedly.

"Hmm?" he asked, not looking away from the still form of his brother.

"Watching him ain't gonna make him wake up. You said you were on to something, before that demon attacked. What was it?"

Sam lifted his head and looked at Bobby blankly. "What?"

"You said you knew of something that might explain some of this - this - this twisted crap," he said testily. "You said you needed time to look it up. Well you might have all night here. So get to it."

"Yes, Bobby," he said simply, turning back to the desk and the computer sat on top. He put the coffee cup down and took a deep breath, leaning over the screen again.

Bobby pushed himself to the end of the bed and sat up, looking Dean over for the fiftieth time. He sighed with unease, clasping his hands together and twisting them in worry for a long moment. He cast a look over at Sam's hard-working back, then looked back at Dean's slack face.

"Come on, son," he breathed quietly. He reached out and put a hand on the dead man's shoulder, squeezing the material slightly. "You know I didn't mean all that crap I said earlier. We're just glad you're back. So come back."

There was no response from Dean. Whether from being raked up by Hellhounds and then repaired, or from the general wear and tear he had been put through since coming back, Dean's hair was starting to flatten all over, as if this world no longer held any excitement for it. The normally flicked-up fringe was approaching a dangerous proximity to his forehead in a way that Bobby knew would annoy the dead man, had he had time to worry about such inconsequential things as hair. The older man let himself smile slightly, recalling how the son who had never been his had always flicked it up the same way since he could unscrew the tub of hair gel himself.

Bobby sneaked a look over his shoulder at Sam, then leaned closer to the dead man. He put his hand up to Dean's hair, moving a few wayward strands and putting them more or less straight and upright. Then he leaned back and patted the dead shoulder. He looked at his empty hands for a long moment, then over at Sam.

"You need any help?" he offered, getting up and walking over. "I'm good at reading books."

.

* * *

.

"'_The idea that the passage of the magical threshold is a transit into a sphere of rebirth is symbolised in the image of the belly of the whale. The hero, instead of conquering or conciliating the power of the threshold, is swallowed into the unknown, and would appear to have died_'," Sam read out slowly. "Sound familiar?"

"It might - if I had the first clue what you're talking about," Bobby grunted. He looked over at Dean, found him still dead, and looked back at Sam. "What else does it say?"

Sam bent closer to the laptop. "Get this - '_He was a hero who, by his courage in the fiery furnace, his unreadiness to break down and grovel before a popular conception of the character of the All Highest, had proven himself capable of facing a greater revelation than the one that satisfied his friends_.'"

"You mean Dean flipped them the bird in Hell, left cos he thought they just didn't cut it as scary authority figures - or cos he didn't believe in the Devil - and it got him like this?" Bobby smiled. "I can see that. What is that from?"

Sam leaned back from the laptop. "That's just it - it's not even a proper prophecy or legend or story or lore or anything we can base it all on. It's from Joseph Campbell - it's his take on the story of Job."

"Job? As in Bible Job?" Bobby scoffed. "Don't think I can see anyone from the Bible crowd coming in and turning Dean into this immortal demon slayer."

"Me neither," Sam said quietly. "I was thinking it was maybe something to do with how he got out - all he said was there some invisible door. He never said how he actually escaped."

"True," Bobby nodded. "Well when he wakes up, we'll ask him."

"_If_ he wakes up," Sam replied softly.

Bobby considered him for a moment. "Sam, come here."

Sam looked at him and then got up. He crossed the room and Bobby stood, pointing at Dean. "Touch his hand."

"What? Why?"

"Just do it."

Sam bent over and put his fingers to the back of Dean's hand. He waited, thinking. Then he looked back at Bobby.

"Is he cold? Warm? What?" Bobby asked.

"He's… not," Sam observed. "Like… there's no temperature at all."

"Exactly - like when we were testing his pulse last night. He's not cold like a corpse. So he ain't _dead_-dead. He'll wake up," Bobby grumped. He turned away, going to Sam's laptop and picking up the Impala keys. "I'm starvin', and we both need food. What do you want?"

"Nah it's ok - I'm good," Sam said, his fingers still on his brother's hand.

"Sam. It's been a whole day. You need something, boy."

"I guess… I guess now Dean doesn't eat… I kinda forgot," Sam allowed on a whisper.

"Sam."

Sam cleared his throat. "Whatever you get."

"Well ok," Bobby said approvingly, nodding and going to the door. It opened and he disappeared outside.

Sam looked down at his brother, then away from his serene face quickly. He patted at the back of his hand before walking back to the laptop.

.

* * *

.

Sam looked up as he heard the motel door open. "Hey, Bobby," he said wearily, wiping his hands over his face. "What did you get?"

Bobby didn't say a word. He simply walked straight past Sam and to the bed, staring down at Dean.

"Is he dead?" he snapped.

Sam got up slowly, his head tilted in confusion. "What?"

"Is he dead?" Bobby repeated. He walked around the bed and snatched up the long-barrelled Colt Paterson, opening the chamber and checking it was loaded.

"Bobby - what are you doing?" Sam asked quickly, already reaching for the paperback book of Latin by his computer.

"Making sure," he barked. He snapped the gun shut and raised it, aiming for Dean's head.

Sam ripped the book of Latin open and began to read.

Bobby turned and waved a hand at him. Sam was tossed across the room. He landed against the door. It slammed shut. He collapsed against it. His head bounced off the wood. Bobby blinked black eyes at him before smiling slightly.

"Wait your turn, boy. Him first, then you," he sneered. He turned back to the bed.

Dean's eyes blinked open. He caught sight of Bobby standing over him. "Hey, Bo--"

"Hold still, wabbit," Bobby ordered maliciously, cocking the Colt.

Dean's hand came up. He grasped the barrel. Bobby flicked his free hand at him. Dean simply pulled on the gun. Bobby pulled back, his black eyes latching onto the younger man with hatred.

"You're supposed to be with us," he growled. "You're supposed to burn for all eternity, Dean!"

"It's not my fault you sorry sons of bitches left the back door open," he snapped back.

He was pulled off the bed as the demon in Bobby yanked at him. He staggered and kept hold of the barrel.

"But someone wants you dead!" the demon hurled. He ripped the gun free and turned, spotting Sam shaking his head groggily. "And that's why I'm here. But maybe I'll torture you first," he added. "I'll kill your darling baby brother and there'll be nothing you can do about it."

Dean launched himself at Bobby's back. They were propelled to the carpet, rolling and scuffling. The Colt skittered clear. The demon weighed the younger man down and drove his elbow into his stomach. Dean curled in pain but snatched a fist up. It whammed square into the demon's borrowed face. He went over backwards.

"Sorry, Bobby," Dean wheezed, rolling to his hands and knees. He reached for the fallen Colt but the demon was quicker. It seized the weapon. Dean changed course, reaching for his brother.

The demon rolled Bobby to his back, the Colt aimed at Sam. "Babies first," he snarled.

"No!" Dean ordered vehemently. He leapt forwards as the demon pulled the trigger.

The loud report of the Colt echoed round the room. The single bullet went straight into Dean's side. He fell on his brother heavily, his eyes sinking shut.

The demon in Bobby began to laugh. "So much for him being immortal!" he crowed gleefully. "Oh, Lilith is so going to reward me for this!"

.

* * *

.

_Thanks for all your lovely reviews and comments so far! I am treasuring every one. :)_


	6. My Dog's Got No Nose

**_SPOILERS FOR SEASON 5 CONTAINED IN THIS CHAPTER!_**

**.**

**

* * *

**

**.**

**SIX**

**My Dog's Got No Nose. **

**So How Does He Smell?**

**Terrible!**

.

Sam grabbed his brother's arms, trying to wrench him up.

"Oh, Sammy," the demon in Bobby chuckled, holding the Colt on him as he dragged himself to his feet, "give it up. This gun kills _anything_, am I right?"

Dean coughed suddenly, his face red. "Oh, pain, just what I was missin'," he wheezed sarcastically, falling free of Sam and rolling to the carpet on his back, his arms out wide.

"Uhm - no, don't think it does!" Sam grinned at the demon.

"But it will kill _you_," he promised, raising the gun again.

Dean was already finding his feet. "Try it," he warned.

The demon fired. Dean dived.

The bullet flew out and into the dead Winchester. He lost his balance, falling to his hands and knees. But then he simply put a foot under him. He pushed on his knee to get up, ostensibly breathing hard, his face red from exertion.

He curled his fingers at the demon in an annoying beckoning gesture. The demon fired again, and again. Then the chamber ran dry.

Dean lurched forward. He put his hand out, taking the Colt in a manoeuvre so fast the demon within Bobby couldn't catch it.

Dean's other hand went into the possessed throat of his long-time friend. "You know what happens now," he snarled.

"Dean! Wait! You want to know how you got like this, right?" the demon whimpered.

"Sam will find out. You'll just lie," he accused.

"No! Sam, tell him! The hero faces the fiery furnace, he is reborn! Only if you turn right - only if you turn _right_!" he pleaded.

"Dean?" Sam ventured.

Dean's hand dropped the Colt to the carpet. Then it snapped round and plunged into Bobby's t-shirt, disappearing inside.

The demon screamed and wailed, the black smoke leaking out and enveloping them both. It roiled and fought until it was burnt off in half a second of brilliant blue fire.

The blue flames cleared. Dean and Bobby were revealed. Dean was holding the older man up, helping him toward the bed.

"Dean," Bobby whispered hoarsely. "Dean."

"Yeah yeah, take a minute," Dean was telling him calmly, guiding him to sit and then fall back on the bed. He stood back, folding his arms and watching him, a familiarly tasked pout on his face.

"Dean?" Sam asked quietly from behind him.

Dean turned. "You ok?"

"Yeah, fine," he managed. "How's Bobby? Did you--"

"I killed the demon. I didn't hurt _him_," he allowed, looking troubled.

Bobby pulled his cap off, getting his breath back. "D-Dean," he managed, waving at him. Dean walked closer, leaning over by the side of the bed to hear him properly. "You hit me again, I'll let the air outta your tyres till she's sittin' on the rims, son."

"You're welcome," Dean grinned, straightening again. He put a hand to his chest, rubbing.

"He shot you," Sam pointed out. "He shot you with the Colt!"

Dean looked down at the holes now in the side and front of his t-shirt. "Yeah, I got that," he said, his face pained. "Oh God, that _hurts_," he hissed suddenly, bending in apparent pain. "Ugh - ugh _crap,_" he spluttered, falling to his knees.

Sam rushed to the bed and grabbed Bobby, pulling him to his feet and to a safe distance. They stood, helplessly watching Dean as he gagged and spluttered.

"Uh oh," Sam breathed in abrupt realisation.

Dean choked once and then his head snapped back. Sam pulled Bobby with him back against the wall. Silver bullets rushed up and out of Dean as if jet-propelled. They smashed up into the ceiling and stayed there. Dean fell to his hands, shaking his head and coughing for a second.

"_Definitely_ better out than in," he grumbled, his voice thick with pain and weariness.

Sam and Bobby edged closer.

"You ok?" Sam dared.

"As I'll ever be, apparently," Dean said sourly. "Demon's dead, Bobby's free, I'm not dead. Still." He got up slowly, but Sam noticed he didn't appear to be struggling this time.

"Dean," Bobby managed. Sam let go of his shoulder and Dean turned to look at the older Singer. Bobby crossed the carpet and grabbed Dean in a bear hug. "You stupid son of a bitch," he accused, still squeezing him tightly. "You coulda been killed with that Colt!"

"I gambled. I won," Dean allowed, attempting to shrug it off. "You sure you're ok, old man?"

Bobby pulled him back, eyeing him. "I'll give ya old man," he warned, pushing him back forcefully. "Sam - look at his eyes," he added over his shoulder.

"What now?" Dean asked with the first sign of fear.

Sam took a step forward. "Well, at least the pupils aren't silver any more," he said philosophically.

"So what are they?" Dean demanded.

"White," Bobby said, staring openly. "Like… someone left the Bat-signal on full beam. Holy Hell son, you got headlamps brighter than your Impala."

"What?" Dean asked, his face paling. He turned and dashed into the bathroom.

"Every time he kills a demon, they change colour, they get brighter," Sam pointed out.

"I noticed. Is this where he goes nuts and passes out again?" Bobby countered.

"Let's hope not. He seems to get stronger each time," Sam replied. "Like ejecting everything that goes in him? The first time looked really bad - the second, not so much."

"Good point. Those bullets came out much easier," he nodded.

"If you two are done talking about how great my Jedi training is going, can someone please explain why I got mini MagLites for eyes?" Dean demanded from beyond the bathroom door.

Sam and Bobby exchanged a look. There was a sigh and a thump from behind the half open door. They went over and opened it to find Dean had collapsed in a heap by the counter.

"Great," Bobby cursed. "Come on, back onto the bed with him."

.

* * *

.

"So they must have a way of finding him," Sam reasoned. "That girl found us before, and that demon jumped you in the parking lot, right outside."

"I know," Bobby grumped. "But until we find out how they're doing it, we just better be on guard. So he can kill 'em, that's great. But he has to touch 'em first."

"Yeah," Sam nodded. He looked past him to see the dead figure of his brother on the bed. "How long do you think he'll be out this time?"

"Who knows," Bobby sighed. "But I think it's time I got myself a tattoo like yours."

"I know a guy," Sam smiled.

"Whoa," came a grunt from behind them.

Bobby and Sam turned gratefully to look at Dean.

"Hey dude," Sam called cheerfully. "How do you feel?"

"I've been better," Dean groused, before sitting up surprisingly quickly. He paused. "No, actually… I'm good," he nodded. "Fantastic. Considering I'm hoping this is just some really assed-out dream." He realised the other two were watching him with a mixture of apology and awkwardness. "Damn. Why me?" he havered, his arrogant smile suddenly smacking much more of bravado.

"Who knows," Bobby allowed. He got up wearily, clapping a hand to Dean's shoulder before walking off to the desk by Sam.

Dean's gaze followed him and then he threw his legs over the edge of the bed. "There's no fixing this, is there?" he asked carefully.

Sam looked at his hands as Bobby hid his face behind a coffee cup.

"Ahm… no, don't think there is," Sam said quietly. "But… look at it this way, you've got awesome super powers now," he managed, his face twisted into an apologetic smile that displayed too many teeth.

"Groovy," Dean sighed. He scratched at his head. "So these are the perks of being dead?"

"Could be worse - you could be in Hell," Bobby reminded him.

"Yeah, there is that," Dean allowed with a small smile that appeared genuine. "Hey - how did those two demons find us, anyway?"

"We're working on that," Sam said confidently. "And we're also working on how you came to be like this in the first place."

"Well that last demon said something about turning right," Dean pointed out. "And that Lilith would be happy I was actually and in every way dead."

"Yeah - are you going to explain how you just sauntered out of Hell now?" Bobby asked.

Dean rubbed a hand over his eyes, then shrugged. He pushed himself off the bed, going to Sam's duffle on the other. He upended it without even asking, rifling through. "There was this door - the door you can't see. I found it and I went round it. Bingo. Done."

"You make it sound so simple," Sam offered.

"Cos it was, Sammy. I just saw it, wandered over to it, stuck my hand into this invisible thing, and then--"

"Pardon me for asking the obvious, here," Bobby interrupted, just as Dean snagged a t-shirt from the pile of Sam's clothes.

"Well?" Dean asked, dropping the t-shirt before pulling his own off unceremoniously. He held it in his hands, running his thumb over the material thoughtfully.

"Uhm - so the bullets went in but they didn't leave a mark?" Sam observed. Dean looked over at him, as if aware someone were talking. Sam waved a finger at Dean's front. Dean looked down at himself, putting a hand to his skin and then sliding it about in a manoeuvre disturbingly reminiscent of a small child knocking sand off himself at the beach.

"Guess the holes sealed up, like when Bobby bashed me in the head with the Colt," he said happily. "Super power perks, I guess," he added, and now he looked much less amused. He dropped his t-shirt to the bed.

"Can I continue?" Bobby interrupted. "If this 'door' was invisible, how did _you_ see it?"

Dean picked up a V necked, olive green t-shirt from Sam's duffle and unfurled it with a snap. He pulled it on over his head, twisting it to get it straight before fishing his amulet out and letting it hang on top.

"You want anything else?" Sam asked sarcastically. "You're not taking my shorts too, man."

Dean simply picked up his discarded t-shirt and turned with it in his hand, his finger poking through a bullet hole made by the Colt. "Little suspicious, don't you think, Sammy?" he asked damningly. His brother let his annoyance go. Dean looked at Bobby. "I didn't actually _see_ the door - it was like… it didn't blend in with what was around it," he said.

"Oh well then, that's fine. So because some bit of the landscape didn't have as good social skills as the rest, you immediately jumped on the idea of it being an invisible door!" Bobby cried, throwing his hands up in the air.

"Ho, slow down," Dean said irritably. "Were _you_ there? Did _you_ kinda half-see it? No, that was _me_ in Hell trying to find the door. I don't really care _how_ I was able to see it, I just care that something _did_ make me notice it, alright?"

"Ok, alright," Sam said quickly, his hands out in a placating gesture. "So what happened then?"

Dean sat on the bed slowly. "Well I stuck my hand in the invisible bit. If I turned it one way, it disappeared. I turned it back and I could see it. That's why I thought it was an exit. I went round it and came out in this dark room by your bed," Dean said matter-of-factly.

"How did you know you'd find me? Us?"

"I didn't," Dean shrugged. "But what did I have to lose, man?"

"Fair enough," Sam allowed. "So… which way did you turn, left or right?"

Dean's eyes rolled up to the ceiling, his bottom lip sticking out as he thought back. "Ahm… left?" he said hesitantly.

"Can't you remember?" Bobby asked.

"Hey, it's been a pretty crazy forty-eight hours so far," Dean pointed out. "How are my eyes?" he added, waving a finger at his face. Sam's eyebrows crouched together for emotional support and Dean sighed. "I take it that means they're still Bat-signals?"

"Yup," Bobby put in. "We figure every time you kill a demon, they get brighter. Or you get stronger. Or more… whatever it is you are now."

"Great. If I kill a hundred, do I get bonus life points?" he asked sourly.

"Dean," Sam said quietly. "Why did you wake up when the demon was in Bobby?"

"Aw hey, I could smell him," he shrugged, then stopped short. "I could smell him. The demon, I mean," he added quickly.

"Smell him?" Bobby prompted.

"Yeah, like… I don't know, there's this kind of… smell," Dean shrugged. "And it just woke me up, I guess."

"Were you actually sleeping?" Sam pressed.

"It's… weird," Dean said uncomfortably. "I don't remember. Anything. In between panicking and then falling over, and then waking up and seeing who I thought was Bobby trying to shoot me, there was… nothing. Just nothing."

"You thought it was Bobby?" Sam asked. "You can smell demons, but you can't see their faces? Like before you… when your deal was nearly up, and you could see their faces?"

"Nah, can't see 'em," Dean said thoughtfully. "That girl," he said suddenly, as if only just realising it himself, "the first demon. I could smell her, too. But I kinda thought it was Sam's crap in his bag," he added apologetically, prompting Bobby to hide a very small smile. "Whoa. Demons. They just honk out loud."

"Of what?" Bobby asked quietly.

"Of… demons. It's like saying what does lemon smell like - it smells like lemon. Demons smell like demons," Dean said reasonably. He looked over at Sam's laptop. "Find anything to classify me yet?"

"Nothing," Sam said nervously. "We're still freaked out over this Colt not being able to kill you."

"Right. I thought Dad said it could kill anything," Dean agreed.

"Well John was wrong. Turns out, it was only ever claimed that this Colt was a killer of anything _evil_ or _unnatural_," Bobby grumped.

"Well I'm at least one of those," Dean shrugged a little sadly.

Sam tutted. "We're looking into the meaning of 'unnatural'," he advised. "It could either mean '_not of Nature_', or it could actually mean '_not of God's work_'."

"Riiiiiight. So either the natural course of events turned me into his undead demon killer with awesome searchlight skills, or God did it. Well I know which one I'd put money on," Dean grumbled.

"We're hoping it puts you above most creatures we come across," Sam nodded. "If it can't kill you, you're not human and you're not on the same level as mortals any more."

Dean just blinked at them both with long lashes. "So if I'm not human… what am I?"

"Well… Daniel Elkins once scribbled in his journal that he recommended it not be used against anything… kinda… ahm… opposite of a demon," Sam said with a shedload of discomfort.

Dean's head tried to turn away but his eyes had already glued themselves to Sam in a gesture of disbelief from which neither of his spectators could look away.

"So you're saying the Colt can't kill angels?" Dean managed. "And it can't kill me. That don't mean I'm an angel."

"You got that right," Bobby said succinctly. "But it does mean you might be on the same pay-grade."

"As _angels_?" Dean spluttered. "Come on, man! There's no such thing!"

"Until two days ago, there was no such thing as you," Bobby said flatly. "So stop thinking like a human - you ain't one any more. Maybe cos you turned left instead of right."

"What does that mean?" Dean cried, lost.

"We have no clue," Sam shrugged, "but right now, it seems to be the only explanation we have. As for how demons find you, that's another--"

"Smell?" Dean asked suddenly. "I mean, I can smell them - maybe they can track _me_ like they're bloodhounds?"

"It's possible," Sam nodded. "So how do we stop it?"

"Well demons don't just track one person unless they're told to," Dean pointed out heavily. "And we know Lilith sent that last dude I toasted."

"And?"

"And if you kill the boss, there's no-one to collect their bounty from if they do kill me, is there? Bam goes their motivation - demons ain't exactly the 'above and beyond' type, so if the boss is dead, they are not going to care if I'm here or not." Dean grinned suddenly. "And let's face it - if I do gank their boss, what demon is going to come after me? She's major partner-in-the-firm material. Kill her, you get left alone by every other asshole who does not want early retirement."

"You're talking about killing _Lilith_," Bobby pointed out harshly.

"Yeah I know," Dean grinned with an enthusiastic nod. "Exciting, ain't it?"

.

* * *

_Ok, so I made up Daniel Elkins' journal scribblings about the limitations of the Colt. I don't actually know why there are five (?) things the Colt can't kill, but I hate a hole, so there we go. Plugged. :)_

_Thanks for your reviews and comments!_


	7. Trajectory Perfectery

**SEVEN**

**Trajectory Perfectery**

.

"Now just hold on there," Bobby said quickly, holding his hand up. "Kill Lilith? You two chuckleheads tried that already - and look where that went!"

"Bobby, this time it's _perfect_," Dean countered. "Last time it was all about ganking her to try and stop the deal without killing Sam. But the deal's _done_, you said after she'd shredded me she crapped herself and retreated. Now she's got nothing on us!"

"But you're talking about finding her and killing her," Sam interrupted.

"What? You're not happy about a dead Lilith? Thought you would have wanted her head on a platter?" Dean asked innocently.

"Dean - look - slow down," Sam said patiently. "What's going on here?"

"What?" he asked, his face screwed up in a patent lack of comprehension. "Which _bit_?"

"Ok, look," Sam said, sitting on the bed across from his brother and pinning him with a look. "Last time you said we should go after her right. We tried, we failed and she killed you with Hellhounds. Now I don't know about you, but I don't want a repeat of that," he said bravely.

Dean's eyes flickered over his face in an uncomfortable gesture that spoke volumes.

"All I want to know is, what's the sudden hurry to kill her?" Sam continued.

"Oooh, let me think, Sam - she's gonna keep trying to kill _us_ if we don't? Oh and by the way, I'm _dead_," Dean cried angrily. "She can't harm me, cos I'm already _dead_! I'm a threat to her now, she's shitting bricks and sending her minions over one at a time to try and kill me - but they don't have the juice. It's _her_ turn to fail at everything she does!" He stood abruptly, waving his arms out. "I can't eat or drink or sleep any more, but I _can_ kill the bitch! Why are we even talking about this?" he demanded.

"Because maybe she can kill _you_," Bobby interrupted. "She ain't a normal demon you know, Dean."

"Then bring it on! We'll find out one way or the other, right? And if I'm right - which I think I friggin' well _am_ - she'll be a rotting corpse as soon as I can get my hands on her. And she can't do a thing to stop me!"

"Dean!" Sam cried worriedly.

"Come on, dude!" he implored, his arms out wide. "I am the ultimate demon killing weapon and you two don't want to use me! Would you seriously carry a BFG-9000 and never pull it?"

"Dean!" Bobby shouted, making the elder Winchester stop short. "What if she kills you?"

"Let her try! I'll rake _her_ into ribbons before she does!"

"And then what?" Sam demanded roughly, jumping to his feet. "By some miracle you kill her but you die - _really _die - forever. And then what?"

"And then you two throw a party because we finally got one over on those evil bastards! You dig up Dad's dogtags and douse 'em in JD - chuck my mullet rock tapes in the river - and everything is _finally _done and settled!" he cried happily.

Sam rushed forwards. He grabbed the front of the t-shirt on his brother, driving him into the wall behind. Dean slammed into the wood and Sam leaned all his weight on his fists, his face red with anger.

"You son of a bitch," he snarled, but it was angry tears making his voice thicken. "You blind, insensitive, arrogant _dick!_"

"Don't forget loud-mouthed," Dean protested with enough sarcasm to fill several orders at Starbucks.

Sam's hands lifted slightly to pull Dean up. He shoved at him again, bouncing him into the wall with force.

"We did everything we could to get over you!" he raged. "I even tried to find Ruby - I summoned and summoned, but the bitch wouldn't come! I offered my soul to _anyone_ who would talk to me at a crossroads, to _any_ demon who would bring you back! I begged and I begged, but they wouldn't listen to me! They laughed in my face, Dean!" Sam shouted, his eyes full.

Dean just swallowed, watching very much against his will.

"And now you want to go kill Lilith and die in some blaze of glory! You want to throw away _everything_ we fought for all these years! Keeping it together cos Dad died - that was us! Finding Azazel and killing him - that was us! Beating his game and bringing me back to life - that was us! _We_ did all that, you and me!" he roared. "Now I gave you crap about selling your soul for me while you were still alive, I know that! But I learned a lot of things while you were dead! I learned to stop getting motels with two beds! I learned to stop ordering two coffees at the truckstop, I learned to stop crying over my dead brother because nothing was going to bring him _back_!" he seethed.

Dean was paralysed, fascinated by the few tears escaping down his brother's red face.

"But you just couldn't let it lie, could you?" Sam accused angrily. "You couldn't just see your place in the world and go with it, right? You had to - to upset the natural order and boot your way out of the back door to Hell! Part of me is so damn proud of you, Dean! Part of me is scared of you and what you're turning into! So listen to yourself, look to what you're doing! You want to kill Lilith? Fine! I'm all over that! You're not the only one who wants her _dead_. But you need me and Bobby too! The day any of us start trying to go it alone is the day all this is over!"

"This what?" Dean whispered, transfixed.

"This! This! All of this!" Sam cried, his tears arrested by his anger. "You and me! Bobby! Family and normal life!"

"We haven't had a normal life since I was four," Dean said sourly.

"Not _ours_ - everyone's!"

"But you've had _family_," Bobby interrupted. "So you let us help, son. You need us, too."

Dean put his hands to Sam's, pushing him off. Bobby moved to drag Sam back but he pulled free of the shorter man. He flung a hand out and grabbed the lone t-shirt over Dean's shoulder, twisting it and pinning him back against the wall. Dean didn't look at him.

"Just don't leave us again," Sam said calmly. He stared at the wall by Dean's dangling hand, but it was a false veneer that Dean chose to ignore.

Dean put his hand up to the wrist, to remove Sam's grip, but he was leaning all his weight on it and Dean couldn't shift it. Sam lifted his chin and stared at his brother. Dean managed to look up at him.

"You did it once. It nearly killed us." Sam took a deep breath, his face turning decidedly threatening. "Don't. Do. It. Again."

There was a long silence.

"When you girls are done, you want to tell me how we can find Lilith?" Bobby grumped, but his voice sounded strained.

Sam let go of his brother abruptly, nodding and sniffing to himself. "Ahm, yeah," he managed gruffly.

Dean looked at the floor, unable to meet either of their gazes. "I'll ah - I'll go check the car over. I want to see what you've done to her radio," he muttered. He walked round them and disappeared out of the motel room silently.

Bobby watched the door close with a slight click and turned back to look at Sam. He turned away and wiped his face dry, sniffing to himself.

"Do me a favour," the older man offered.

"Yeah?" Sam replied quietly, not looking at him.

"Next time just hit him. It's good for him and a Hell of a lot quicker." He turned and retreated to the desk under the window, going through his backpack for books.

.

* * *

.

Dean re-appeared much later, finding the two hunters asleep in the only two beds in the room. He sighed, went into the bathroom, and washed off the grease from two hours of checking under the bonnet of his beloved.

He dried his hands on a towel, watching the two sleeping humans with immense thought. The light in the room was off, but the television set flickered away with what appeared to be commercials. He set down the towel and rubbed his forehead before he realised he did not feel the least bit weary or tired. Prepared to accept this as another perk of being dead, he went to the television and turned it silently to point into the corner of the room furthest from the door. He picked up the remote and the wooden chair from under the far window, carrying them over to the darkest corner and putting them down. He went back to the bed, picking up the Colt and the wooden box next to it and retreating to the chair.

He sat for a while, simply staring into space, turning everything over in his mind. Then he picked up the remote and flicked through the channels. He paused on something very new-looking, apparently called 'BBC America', and sat back in the chair. He picked up the Colt, opened the box, and pulled out an oily rag.

And that's how he spent the entire night. He began by keeping one eye on cleaning and reloading the Colt Paterson, the other on the television, which appeared to be telling tales of immortal secret agents and their thrilling adventures. He went on to swallow and eject popcorn in controlled bursts as he enjoyed the irony of himself, undead, watching a similarly unkillable character on some imported television show, where people with weird accents chased aliens.

Because, as he realised with less upset and more resignation, it was all he _could_ do.

.

* * *

.

Sam opened his eyes. He heard the gruff chuckle of his brother and sat up with a jerk. He stared for a moment, finding Dean watching the television while he held pieces of popcorn in his hand. He appeared to be engrossed in some programme, ignorant of his brother's startled awakening.

"Dean?" Sam checked.

"Yeah, Sam," he grinned, his eyes still on the screen. Action and great drama was afoot and Dean could not be torn away. "Shoot him, man!" he urged with an effort to keep his voice quiet, '_ooooh_'ing as the character onscreen aimed and let off two shots. "Jesus - for an immortal secret organisation guy, your aim sucks!"

"Dean," Sam tried again.

"Hmm?" he managed, yanking his attention to his brother.

"You're not eating that, are you?" Sam asked, eyeing the amount of popcorn in his brother's hand.

"What? No," he said scathingly, dropping it to the plastic tub in his lap. "Hang on - watch this," he grinned suddenly, delving into the tub and flicking pieces into his mouth.

"That's going to come out again," Sam observed wearily, scratching at the t-shirt over his front.

"I hope so," Dean mouthed round the snack, "or else I can't do my new party trick." He swallowed the popcorn and then turned to face his brother. "Ready?"

"No," Sam said pointedly.

Dean grinned, then appeared to hiccup without sound. Sam watched, aghast, as his brother tilted his head back and coughed abruptly in three staggered emissions. Popcorn shot up in three small controlled volleys, as if directed from a weapon. The third salvo hit the underside of the second, combining to fire up and into the first projectile, splitting it into shrapnel that fell around the elder Winchester like rain.

"See? How awesome is that?" Dean proclaimed with pride.

Sam's mouth worked but nothing came out.

"Aw come on, you wish you could do it," Dean teased. "It's awesome, huh? Huh?"

Sam just shook his head, rubbing an eye and swinging his legs over the side of the warm blankets. "And that's what you've spent all night doing?"

"Nah. Cleaned the Colt, reloaded it - you can thank me later. Used your laptop, visited a few sites - and man, am I glad I did," he whistled to himself.

"News sites?" Sam asked innocently.

"Put it this way; my online membership to is still valid for another two months, and more importantly: no, I am not a Ken doll but a fully functioning member of the male half of the population," Dean asserted, the tip of his tongue between his teeth as he nodded away with a maddening grin.

"Oh, dude, TMI," Sam protested, waving a hand at him. "That's all you've done all night?"

"Hey, I had six months' worth blocking the pipes. And anyway, I thought it would be useful to know how to control this spewing thing. I mean, better out than in and all that, but controlling it--"

"Dean, seriously!" Sam cried. "This bathroom better be clean!"

"I was talking about the popcorn," Dean called after him as he disappeared into the bathroom. He turned to find Bobby awake in the furthest bed, watching him with distaste. "Oh hey, Bobby," Dean said weakly, waving a hand at him.

"Hmm," Bobby grumped.

.

* * *

.

"Ok, look at this," Sam said excitedly, turning the laptop round. Bobby leaned a hand on the desk, peering at it.

"Demonic signs?" he asked, viewing the list of natural disasters centred on the one town.

"Looks like. You think Lilith might be there?"

"We can hope. I'll put in a few calls to some hunters, see if they've heard anything." Bobby paused at the swishing sound of water behind him. "Dean!" he cried, annoyance adding to his volume.

He turned round to find Dean by the window, a coffee cup in his hand and his head tilted back. Jets of brown liquid were flying up and out of his mouth and down again, some colliding in mid-air, some reaching the ceiling.

"Will you knock it off!" Bobby warned.

Dean sent the last coffee jet up into the air, stepping back to catch it in the cup in his hand. "Just practising."

"Well get in that shower and make it quick. I don't care if you don't sweat any more - you reek and you need a change of clothes. Now _get_," Bobby ordered.

"Yes Bobby," Dean muttered, putting the cup down and picking Sam's duffle up from the desk by him. He fished around for clothes before Bobby huffed and leaned back to his own bag. He pulled out a clean checked shirt and tossed it at the dead Winchester. Dean caught it gratefully, pulled off his boots, and walked past both living people. He closed the bathroom door behind him.

"We'll leave as soon as he's done prettying himself in there," Bobby grumped, going to the bed and picking up his coffee on the side table. "And we do this right, Sam. You said it, now you're gonna abide by it - we're a team."

"Yes Bobby," Sam grinned.

.

.


	8. Lights! Demon! Action!

**EIGHT**

**Lights! Demon! Action!**

.

Dean picked up he and Bobby's duffles, leaving them to check the motel room as he went out to the Impala. Satisfied nothing had been left behind, the two living humans went out to the car park. Dean was opening the boot, dropping duffles in and closing the lid, as Sam pulled the motel room door shut quietly.

Bobby walked on but Sam caught his arm. "Bobby," he said quickly.

"What now?"

"You think he can do this? You think he can kill Lilith?" Sam asked quietly.

"I don't know, Sam. I do know he was right - he is the best demon-killing weapon we got. So let's use him."

"But… every time he kills a demon he seems to get stronger - further removed from human. What if killing her - if he can do it - tips him over some edge? So he can never come back?"

Bobby turned to face him, studying him for a long moment. "You think he can ever be human again?" he challenged. "You think he can ever come back to life as he was before? Sorry, Sam, I think that ship has well and truly sailed."

Sam let his hand drop, his face following suit. "Yeah," he admitted uncomfortably.

"At least he don't need food any more. Or sleep. He'll have to learn to do research - he can be doing it while you're sleeping," Bobby added with a twinkle to his eye, and Sam smiled suddenly.

"Yeah. Good thinking, Bobby."

They looked up at the sound of Dean's cheerful voice from across the car park. A woman had stopped by the car to smile and talk to him, and Sam and Bobby exchanged a glance.

"Even dead, he gets more girls than you do," Bobby grunted, about to walk over. Dean's face was smiling as he put a hand out, shaking the girl's.

Sam did not understand what happened next. One moment Dean was pleasantly greeting the young woman, then next his other hand had hold of the back of her neck, her cheek pressed against the boot of the Impala, as if the moment in between had never existed.

"What the--?"

Sam and Bobby began to run at the car.

Dean dragged the girl up, pulling her after him as he aimed for the motel again. Sam and Bobby just stumbled back, agog, as Dean booted in the door and dragged the girl in. Screams, smoke and a bright blue flash poured out of the door.

Then it was silent.

Sam and Bobby dared to look at each other before hurrying for the motel room door. Sam burst in first, looking in to find Dean standing, staring down at the corpse on the floor.

"She was already dead," he allowed. "Demon's dead too, now."

"How did you know she was a demon?" Sam gasped, running to check for a pulse on the girl on the carpet.

"The smell."

"And you just killed her?" Bobby demanded. "She could have told us where Lilith is!"

"She could have told Lilith we're coming for her," Dean countered faintly. Bobby looked at him as Dean's knees buckled. He staggered, trying to stay upright, before dropping to the carpet, his legs curled up next to him. He put his hands out, leaning on them and closing his eyes.

"You gonna pass out again now?" Bobby asked gingerly.

"N-nah," Dean managed, but he did sound very weary. "Think I'm - I'm good."

"Well we need to leave," Sam observed. "I just hope no-one saw you abusing a girl in a parking lot."

"It was - was a demon," Dean groaned, falling to his elbows.

"Well _we_ know that, but no-one else does, smart-ass," Bobby snapped. "Get up. Get in the car." He turned to the other Winchester. "Sam? Leave her. We don't have time for this. We'll call the cops from the car so she gets found. Come on."

"Yes Bobby," Sam said, but he looked undecided as he got to his feet. He looked at Dean. "Hey, you ok?"

"Yeah," Dean protested, but his voice was strained. "I'm peach--" He flopped to the carpet, inanimate.

"Aw great," Bobby accused. "Now you gotta help me carry the dead weight to the damn car!"

.

* * *

.

Sam clutched the wheel tightly, which had nothing at all to do with the faster than average speed to which he was pushing the Impala, and everything to do with the way his eyes flicked to the reflection of his brother in the back seat.

Still. Peaceful. Dead.

"Leave him," Bobby commented, flicking through a thick paperback to the late afternoon sunshine coming in through the passenger window.

"It's just… It's just not fair," Sam muttered.

"Life ain't fair, son. So now, I guess, death ain't either."

Dean opened his eyes with an abruptness matched only by his lightning manoeuvre that brought him sat up straight.

"Holy crap!" Sam gasped, swerving slightly in the road. "Don't do that, Dean!"

"Sorry," he managed, blinking round the back seat of the car. "Where are we? When are we?"

"You been out twenty minutes," Bobby mumbled, apparently pre-occupied with his book.

"Oh. Is that shorter than last time?" Dean asked.

"Much," Sam admitted. He glanced up at the mirror, then fixed his eyes back on the road.

"Cool. Maybe I'm getting better at this." Dean paused, then Sam jumped as he cried, "Whoa! Son of a bitch!"

Sam flicked his eyes up the mirror again, saw nothing untoward, and kept driving.

"What now?" Bobby asked quietly.

"Stop the car!" Dean cried, sounding very shaky. "Stop the goddamn car _right now_!"

Sam checked his mirrors for traffic before pulling off the road and sliding to a halt in the gravel. "What?" he demanded, turning to look over the back seat.

"Are you seeing this?" Dean demanded, holding his hand out toward his brother, palm up.

Sam looked at his hand. "You have a hand?" he asked, deadpan.

"It's _glowing_!" Dean protested. "Holy crap, man! Look at it!"

Sam opened his mouth to protest, then stopped short as he saw Dean's face properly.

"Bobby," Sam said quietly. "Bobby, look."

Bobby slapped his book shut and turned to look. He blinked, thought for a moment, and then blinked again. "His eyes."

"Yeah, I know," Sam allowed. "But look at his face."

"It's glowing, right? Is it glowing?" Dean pressed, aghast. He rolled the sleeve of Bobby's black and white checked shirt up his arm hastily. "What the Hell is it?"

"Yeah… it's… a little light," Sam said weakly. He put his hand out and touched Dean's arm. "That's warm!"

"It doesn't feel warm," Dean said, but he sounded very alarmed. "What's happening to me? Am I burning up or something?"

"I don't know, but your eyes are lighting up the car," Bobby observed. "See," he added, gesturing with his head to the back of the front seat. It appeared that wherever Dean directed his head, patches of light accompanied them.

"Great! My Bat-signals are now _Escape From New York_ searchlights!" Dean cried shakily. "And I'm _glowing_!"

"Ok - ok - calm down," Sam said quickly. "This just seems to be how it goes."

"Seems? How _what_ goes, Sam?" he demanded fearfully. "What happens the next time I kill a demon, I turn into a Roman Candle?"

"It's like you're being lit up from the inside," Bobby said slowly. "Ok, our theory about how he got to come back is looking less unnatural and more like divine intervention."

"What are you saying?" Dean breathed with real fear. "What does that mean?"

Sam cleared his throat quietly. "It means you could be turning into an--"

"Don't say 'angel'!" Dean exploded, the fear in his voice chilling them both. "Don't make me slap that word out of your mouth, Sammy. There's no such thing. This is just… something else really freaky!"

"Like what?" Bobby accused. "You know something else that would shine a light and smite demons?"

"I ain't smiting any damn thing! I just kill 'em!" Dean protested.

"Same-same," Bobby observed.

"Whatever! I ain't an angel, Bobby! There is absolutely no way in H--"

"No way in Hell?" Sam interrupted. "But it looks like there is a way once you're _out_ of Hell."

Dean's mouth snapped shut with an audible click and he turned his bright white pupils on his brother in a searing show of disapproval. Sam blinked and put a hand up, shading his eyes.

"Dude, those are getting blinding," he said uncomfortably.

Dean closed his eyes, rubbing them in worry. "This is all screwed," he said, apparently to himself, as Sam and Bobby exchanged a look of trepidation themselves. Dean looked up again. "Right. Let's just find Lilith and gank her."

"_Smite_ her," Bobby corrected.

"_Gank_ her. And _anyone else_ who pisses me off," Dean said grimly, opening his eyes wider to blind Bobby into looking away. Bobby screwed his eyes up against the bright flares and did just that.

Sam turned round and checked the traffic before pulling out onto the road. He refused to check the rear mirror for his brother's face as he headed on out of town.

.

* * *

.

Dean sat in the back seat of the car, arms folded, face a picture of mighty wrath as Sam and Bobby found a place to make into their base of operations. As the eldest Winchester continually checked his arm to see if the slight glow had in any way intensified, Bobby carried duffles into their new motel room, Sam in hot pursuit, ready to set up his laptop.

After a while, Dean got out of the car and stomped over to the motel room, slamming the door behind him as if it needed pushing back a few inches. His bright beams swept over the dingy room, surprising Sam and Bobby with their brightness and range.

"Uh - that's kind of helpfu--"

"Shut up," Dean grumped, trudging to the nearest bed and landing his backside on it rather heavily.

He rolled the sleeve down again and tugged at the other one to lengthen it slightly. Bobby noticed the manoeuvre. The way the open cuffs flopped over Dean's hands a little too long reminded him rather too much of a teenage Dean who had also once borrowed a shirt. Bobby cleared his throat and made himself look away, burying the memory.

Sam cleared his throat, glancing at Bobby in apology before turning back to his laptop. "I was re-reading that book," he offered. "There's something interesting you might want to see."

"Show me," Bobby urged, putting his hand out.

Sam pulled a paperback from his duffle, tossing it to him. "Page thirty, by the illustration."

Bobby flicked through until he found the page, muttering to himself. He squinted, then looked up at Sam. "A cosmogenic round?" he hazarded. "What's that?"

"_Please_ tell me that's a round of Black Hole shots," Dean interrupted from the bed.

The others ignored him. Bobby looked back at the passage. "'_A hero ventures forth from the world of common day into a region of supernatural wonder: fabulous forces are encountered and a decisive victory is won: the hero comes back from this mysterious adventure with the power to bestow boons on his fellow man_.'" He waited for some pithy comment from Dean, but when met with silence, simply cleared his throat and turned his attention on Sam.

"Now skip to page ninety-two. It's marked," Sam said nervously.

Dean turned to watch as Bobby flicked past pages, arriving at the one in demand.

"'_...The passage into a temple and the hero-dive through the jaws of a whale are identical adventures, both denoting, in picture language, the life-renewing act. 'No creature,' writes Ananda Coomaraswamy, 'can attain a higher grade of nature without ceasing to exist.' Indeed, the physical body of the hero may be actually slain, dismembered, and scattered over land or sea_'--"

"If you think this is talking about me, you better hope no-one tries to dismember me," Dean interrupted finally. "I ain't in the mood."

Bobby sniffed and carried on. "'_...And therein lies his power to save; for his passing and returning demonstrate that through all the contraries of phenomenality the Uncreate-Imperishable remains, and there is nothing to fear.'_"

"Whoa," Dean breathed. "That's deep. What had _that_ guy been smoking?"

"Yeah," Bobby allowed, looking up at Sam. "You think Glow-Stick Boy here really stumbled out of Hell without anyone noticing? Cos something tells me someone or some_thing_ dropped this 'boon' of being able to kill demons in his back pocket as he was getting out of Dodge."

"You mean… some demon did this to him? As he was escaping?" Sam asked quietly.

"Hey, I'm still here," Dean protested. "And no-one touched me, man. I had to stove-pipe this dude who couldn't even see the exit, but he didn't lay a finger on me."

"Well that rules demons out," Sam shrugged.

"Maybe. Still leaves the other side," Bobby warned.

"For the last time, it wasn't friggin' angels! They ain't real! And even if they were, they wouldn't be hanging round the stage door hoping I'd come out at the right exit, would they?" Dean cried, exasperated.

Sam and Bobby simply shrugged at each other. Bobby looked down at the book, reading the cover. "Joseph Campbell again?" he grumped. "This guy's following us around."

"Maybe _he_ did this to me, just to sell some books," Dean grumped.

"I find it hard to believe a man like Joseph Campbell would have gone to Hell when he died," Sam snorted, turning again for his laptop.

"Why? Is he related to _Bruce_ Campbell?" Dean asked innocently.

Sam just rolled his eyes, but Bobby tossed the book at Dean. He caught it awkwardly, his lip pulled up in a grumpy lack of appreciation at being a target.

"Now Sam, you look at this," Bobby said, opening his own paperback book from the heap of things in front of him, holding it out to the younger man.

Sam took the book and read the passage that Bobby leaned over and tapped for him. "An oil that traps a demon inside the host?" he murmured. "We could use this to keep Lilith from slipping her meatsuit, right? It would make her easier to kill if she couldn't leave."

"Damn right," Bobby nodded. "And I think I got all I need with me."

Dean turned and looked over, his eyes sending long streaks of light across the room. "Seriously? What the Hell do you keep in your duffle, Bobby?" he asked incredulously.

"Well every time I get mixed up with you two yahoos I know I'm gonna need the heavy stuff," he groused. "So shut up while I start trying to make some up. We also need to stamp the stuff into some of her skin."

"Like a brand?" Dean asked faintly, possibly thinking ahead.

"Yeah. You got something we could use?"

Dean lifted his hand and pointed a finger at the ceiling. Sam and Bobby looked up, prompting Dean to tut. "_This_," he urged, shaking his hand, and they appraised him.

"Seriously?" Sam asked.

"Well it goes into people and sets fire to demons, Sammy," he shot back.

"Fine. Bobby?"

"I'm going to get started on devil's traps and then this oil," Bobby grumped, doing just that.

Sam nodded, sitting and opening the computer. "I'm going to look for fresh signs of Lilith in this town."

"I guess I'm going nowhere," Dean sighed. He reached over and picked up the television remote, clicking the set on. A few minutes of channel-hopping saw him racking a channel up on the room bill and settling back on the bed, grinning.

"Dean, turn that off," Bobby ordered, upending his expansive bag to sift through for ingredients.

"Sorry, Bobby, but I'm the only useless one right now. I got nothing else to do - and that immortal dude with the badass coat is on."

"You are so paying for that channel when we leave here," Sam muttered, pre-occupied.

"Fine," Dean nodded, dropping the remote to the bed next to him and getting comfortable in front of BBC America.

.

* * *

.

A few hours spent concocting dark a coloured mixture that resembled dishwater later and Bobby decided it was as good as it was going to get. He poured the dull, sluggish mixture out of the room's coffee jug and into one of the paper cups provided, looking at it with suspicion.

Dean noticed and put his hand out for the cup. "This it?"

"No, it's Starbucks' freshly ground," he tutted. "What do you think?"

Dean sniffed at the cup and then looked back up at the older man. "Smells like cinnamon."

"It should, that's the base ingredient," he said, taking the cup back off him and setting it on the table by the television. "Now don't touch it or spill it - I ain't got enough to make any more."

"Yes Bobby," Dean allowed, looking over at Sam and his laptop. "Hey, Research Boy - anything?"

"No. There were plenty of freaky natural disasters here right up until about… six hours ago," he said, sitting back in the chair. "Does that mean Lilith was here and split when she realised we had arrived?"

"I'm telling you man, she is shitting bricks," Dean grinned. "This is going to be easy."

There was a knock at the door. All three men looked at it with suspicion.

"Hello?" Sam called, with an effort to sound cheerful. Dean waved a hand at him to get his attention, before making a show of sniffing, his face something straight from the picture dictionary under 'revolted'. Sam reached for his duffle quickly, rifling through to find the Colt. "Hello?" he called again.

Dean waved Bobby back away from the door. He grabbed his duffle and hurried back, no desire to be close to the possibly demonic presence on the other side.

"Sam?" came the amused reply. "Sam, I knew it would be you."

"Who's that?" Sam demanded, already checking the Colt was loaded before snapping it shut and aiming it at the door. Dean stepped in front of him but he edged to one side, keeping his aim clear and steadfast on the door.

"It's me, you silly goose," came the giggling voice.

"Lilith?" Dean called.

"Oh, ok, you got me," the voice replied, the doorknob turning slowly. "Hey, Dean," it continued, as the door swung open to reveal a young woman with a decidedly wicked grin. "We meet again. I forgot my Hellhounds this time. But enough about me, let's talk about you."

.

.


	9. When Two Tribes Go To War

**NINE**

**When Two Tribes Go To War**

.

The woman was tall and slim, her long blond hair bouncing around her as she took a step inside the room. She stopped, keeping one foot behind her as she pushed the door closed.

"Aww, look," she grinned, pulling her foot back to join the other one. "A devil's trap? All for me? You shouldn't have," she added, sliding across the door to her left.

Sam raised the Colt. "Stay. I don't want to hit the wall," he threatened.

"Oh Sam - how have you been? Oh wait, I know - crying, sobbing, heart-broken and pretty much drunk. Poor baby. You really should have been my friend, you know. We could have got so many good things done this past six months."

Sam cocked the gun quickly, a swallow concealing most of his anger. "I've been waiting for this for a very long time," he bit out.

"Yes, I know you have," she commiserated. "Shame it was for nothing."

She flicked her hand out. Sam did not move but the gun was wrenched from his grip. It flew toward her. She grasped it and giggled inanely. She turned on Bobby, her eyes turning to milky white orbs as she whisked him off his feet. He tumbled into the wall, sliding down and staying there, pinned down.

"Now then," she said, turning to Dean. "Ho-ly crap," she stated in awe, before regrouping and clearing her throat. "Nice eyes. Look like mine, don't you think?"

"Nah. I got Batman searchlights - you just got cataracts," he shot back.

"Ah - I have so missed you," she grinned. "Want to come over to the Dark Side voluntarily so I'll spare your little brother?"

"Screw you," Dean said sweetly.

She clapped her palms together, sandwiching the gun and giggling. "Oh yes _please_," she begged. "The last thing on my list for you, but maybe we could do it backwards."

"Well hey, new positions are always good," Dean said tersely. "Pity you ain't going to be round long enough for us to try 'em out."

"You say that now," she grinned slyly, taking a step toward him, around the edge of the spray-painted devil's trap. "My, my, my," she said, looking him up and down, "you're just shiny all over, aren't you? Do you glow in the dark, too?"

"Cute," he bit out.

"Hmm. Not as cute as your brother. He's _sooo_ nice," she moaned, stealing another step forwards. "I could just bite him all over. In fact, I think I _will_."

She began to walk toward Sam. He stood his ground, pulling his right hand free from behind him, brandishing the demon knife. Lilith grinned, still walking.

"Aww, Ruby's little pigsticker? Now that really _is_ cute," she fawned, reaching out for it.

Sam made a grab for the gun in her hand as she swiped for his blade.

"Oooh! Party games!" she giggled. "Yummy!" She grabbed Sam's wrist, twisting it until he had to let go. The knife tumbled to the carpet. Dean slid in to snatch it up. Lilith let go of Sam. She bent and grasped Dean's throat, propelling him up and through the air. He landed against the television table. The coffee jug toppled over. The paper cup wobbled.

"Dean!" Bobby cried angrily.

Dean's wits shook off the blow to the head and recovered their equilibrium. He turned and snatched up the coffee cup to save the murky contents.

"Coffee's not going to save you now," Lilith sneered. "In fact, there's nothing on Earth - including you, Dean Winchester, and your pathetic angel powers - that can save any one of you."

Dean upended the coffee cup and swallowed the muddy concoction. "For the last time," he said, slamming the cup down and getting to his feet, "they ain't _angel powers_!"

He advanced on her with purpose. She took a step back but he swung for her anyway. She ducked back and giggled, delighted. He stepped forward with the momentum of his strike. She grasped at his arm but he yanked. She was pulled toward him. He got a hand in her hair and his head powered forward. There was a sickening crack as their heads collided.

Lilith cried out in pain. Dean let her go. She toppled backwards. Dean wiped at the point of contact on his forehead before closing on her again. She scuttled backwards on the carpet, stopping abruptly before she could cross the devil's trap.

"Bastard!" she hurled, but she was grinning. "You know I like it rough! Come and get me, big boy!"

He reached down for her and she drove her foot up into his face. He flew back and into the far wall. The plaster and wood underneath gave in testament to the ferocity of the impact. He slid down to his feet unscathed and unfazed. She stood, dusting herself off.

"Why would you think you could possibly kill me?" she spluttered in bemusement.

"Oh sweetheart, I'm Duncan MacLeod, I'm Kenny McCormick, I'm that dude on BBC America with the blue swishy coat, I'm Captain friggin' Scarlet," Dean replied unctuously. "Why would you think you could kill _me_?"

Her smile slipped for the barest of moments. "I had so much fun watching you die the last time," she said quickly, jutting her chin out. "This time I'll make it last longer."

Dean coughed, rubbing his chest. "Really?" he asked cynically. "Then let's get it on, bitch, I'd like to see you try killin' something immortal."

She growled something and ran at him. He grabbed for her. She slipped to one side and swung her fist around. It caught Dean in the face and he went down on hand and knees. She drove her boot up and into his ribs. He flew over onto his back, scrabbling to get up. She aimed for him but something grabbed her arm.

She turned. Sam dragged on her arm, the demon knife back in his hand. He plunged it down at her. She grabbed his wrist easily. She twisted. There was a dull smack and Sam crumpled in pain. She pushed him from her just as something large and heavy barrelled into her like a Mack truck.

She found herself weighed to the floor, Dean's hand round her throat. "This has been a long time coming," he seethed.

She bucked up and threw him off as if he weighed nothing. She jumped to her feet, stepping round a physically incapacitated Sam. He was holding his right wrist straight, his face running with sweat from the pain. Lilith walked up to Dean. She grabbed his neck and hauled him up, grinning in his face.

"You know what? You Winchesters are all the same. Poor Daddy was just like you too. All he ever did was piss and moan. Never put his money where his mouth was!" she snarled.

Dean coughed as she squeezed harder. "You - you don't want to do that," he wheezed past her vice-like grip.

"Oh really? What are you going to do, choke and die too soon?"

"Oh, I think I'm gonna choke alright," he grinned. "I got you just where I want you."

"Aww, sweetie," she cooed, sliding her other hand down his face, noting it was strangely devoid of temperature. "If you wanted dominating, you only had to ask."

But Dean got his feet under him and stood tall, showing no effects from her apparent death-grip. She squeezed harder, alarmed, but he wasn't reacting at all. She concentrated on her grip but it was as if he could feel nothing. His hand came up. It took a firm hold of her arm as his chest seemed to ripple. His head flew back and a brown, chalky substance shot up and rained down over her.

"Mmm," she teased, licking her lip. "Tastes like--"

She blinked. One moment she had been holding Dean Winchester by the throat. The next he had slipped her grasp and had grabbed both sides of her neck in his hands. She tried to work out where the moment in between had gone and why she hadn't seen it.

Dean pressed with both hands. Blue fire flared up and bubbled against her skin. She screamed in pain and anguish.

"Nooo! What are you--"

His hands came free. His boot came up and she felt it slam into her chest. She left the ground with a tremendous _whoosh_. The next thing she felt was something hard in the back of her head as she slid down to the floor.

She fought to get up. "What did you do?" she managed in fright, feeling at the slightly raised ridges of burnt skin on her neck.

But Dean didn't answer. He simply strode over, his hand going out and grabbing her arm. She pushed at him, struggling in his grip. He continued to pull until she was almost touching his t-shirt.

"Got any last words?" he breathed dangerously.

"I'll kill you!" she seethed. "I'll flay all of you sorry assholes alive piece by piece!"

"Wrong answer," Dean advised darkly. He lifted his free hand and she saw it glowing a dull off-white.

"What - what are you?" she shivered in fear. "You're not an immortal! You're an ange--"

Dean plunged his hand right into her chest. His hand was swallowed up. Black smoke fought against the branded palm prints on her neck. It roiled and protested, screaming to be let out of the host body, to escape. Lilith managed to get a hand up. She shoved as hard as she could, but Dean had her fast.

She wailed and squirmed, pushing and fighting. The black smoke bubbled and hissed hot pain behind her white eyes. Dean's face began to turn red, the tendons starting to stand out in his neck. His left leg weakened as she screamed and pushed at him. He grunted something and closed his eyes.

"Dean!" Bobby shouted. "Dean, son! Stop!"

Dean gritted his teeth and piled on the pressure. His entire face was red with the fantastic forces of exertion going on. Lilith wailed in agony. Dean cried out thickly in pain, still gripping, still fighting.

Blue fire licked up round Dean's palm prints on her neck. The fire burbled and sparked but refused to engulf anything. Lilith began to pull, her movements more certain. Dean shouted, his voice thick with rage. He bent to his task with everything he had.

"You'll - kill - me," Lilith screamed in delight, "_but - only - if you - die too!_"

The blue flames receded, reduced to tiny sapphire flashes up and down her skin.

"You haven't got it in you!" she accused.

Dean let go of her arm. He plunged his second hand into her. She gasped and bucked in pain, her arms out in shock. She wailed and cursed. He struggled and spluttered. The blue flames flared up brilliantly around the palm prints on her neck. They fought to spread, fought to engulf more. They flickered and gained, flickered and lost ground. They devoured her neck, then fell back to the prints. They pulsed with intent as she screamed. They faded then flamed brighter as Dean shouted in effort.

A single shot silenced the war.

Lilith gasped in once. She tumbled backwards, red and yellow crackles zipping over her in mad patterns. She hit the carpet with no sound. Her arms fell out wide as she bounced to her rest directly in the middle of Bobby's devil's trap.

Dean dropped to his knees, rasping for air with desperation.

Sam stood tall some way behind him, the Colt a smoking servant in his left hand. He let it drop to his side with palpable satisfaction, even as he shook with pain and exhaustion. He passed his panting brother to stand over the dead demon.

"That was for my brother," he said with vindication so absolute it roused Bobby from his shocked haze against the wall.

"Sam," he whispered, then slowly got to his feet. He pointed past him. "Sam."

The youngest Winchester turned to see his brother had collapsed on his heels. Sweat was pouring down his face, his eyes bright white beams of something that appeared to be casting odd shadows over Lilith. His breathing was fast and shallow as the weird shapes of light seemed to dance away from Lilith and follow the path back to his eyes.

"See?" he managed weakly. "Better out than in." He smiled giddily, apparently drunk on either adrenaline or nervous energy.

Then his eyes closed and he fell over sideways.

Sam dropped the gun and rushed over to him, his own broken wrist forgotten. Bobby hurried over, checking Lilith's host. He searched for a pulse, some breath, anything to indicate life. He opened the girl's eye and saw the human eye of green staring at eternity. He sat back, convinced she was at last actually and in every way dead.

He looked up as Sam put his hand on his brother's neck.

"Dean?" Sam asked. He lifted his hand suddenly, gasping in horror. "Bobby!" he cried.

Bobby dropped next to him quickly, looking Dean over. "He looks like crap."

"Feel his skin!" Sam cried in terror. "Feel it!"

Bobby dared to put a hand out to the fallen man's neck. He felt for a pulse before he kicked himself for searching for something a dead man didn't have. Then he paused as he realised something.

"He's cold," he stated. "He's _cold_, Sam!"

"Does that mean he's dead? Really dead?" Sam demanded, anguished.

"I don't--"

"_Is he dead?_" he raged, his face wet. He grasped his brother's cold shoulder with his one good hand and lifted him, holding him off the floor. "Dean! Dean! Wake up, Dean, _please!_"

Bobby shrank back a foot, not daring to try and split the two of them.

Not now.

"Dean!" Sam cried in desperation, shaking his brother slightly. "Dean! Wake up! _Wake up!_"

.

.


	10. It's A Secret

**TEN**

**It's A Secret. I Could Tell You, But Then I'd Have To Kill You**

.

Sam let his cold brother back to the carpet, clutching at his own broken wrist in pain and heart-break.

"He _knew_ he'd die! He _knew_ it!" Sam accused angrily, hot salty tears sailing over his face.

It was silent, save Sam's efforts to hush his tiny escapees of anguish, for several minutes.

Finally, Bobby could bring himself to move. He put his hand out, grabbing the younger man's shoulder and pulling him back. Sam tumbled from his heels to slam onto his backside on the carpet, his wrist cradled against his chest and his eyes staring at nothing.

"Let me see your wrist," Bobby instructed.

"Leave me alone," Sam heaved.

"Sam! There's nothing I can do for him, but I ain't leaving you with that huge swelling and broken bones. Now let me damn well see!" he shouted raggedly.

Sam let him pull his elbow, dragging his wrist from his front and into Bobby's field of vision.

"This is going to need a hospital," he observed quietly, looking around the room at the carnage.

Lilith's host, the demon presumably having left her upon its death, lay behind them on the devil's trap, her arms still out wide. A broken coffee jug and a demon knife littered the floor, the Colt taking a well deserved rest just out of reach. Bobby looked up at his bag on the far bed, thinking about the first aid kit that was in it somewhere.

"The first thing you need is painkiller," he judged, getting up to head for his bag.

Sam's eyes remained on his brother. "Don't think it's going to work," he whispered.

Bobby bit his lip, going with trademark stoicism to his bag and carrying it over. "Listen to me, Sam. I know Dean's gone, I know it's hit you hard - again. But we're gonna have the cops here soon. We made enough noise to bring down the FBI, and we got to get out of here now."

"We can't leave him here."

"We won't - he's coming with us. We should bury him. Or do you want to try saltin' and burnin' the smug bastard this time?" He flinched at his own harshness, yet he knew it was the only way to voice what he had to. He bit down on his tongue, waiting for Sam's fist to flail into his face.

But it didn't come. Sam sat, motionless, a tiny smile fighting for and winning time on his lips. He let his gaze wander up and away from his brother.

"At least he saw it," Sam whispered. "He saw Lilith dead. That's one thing."

"Yeah. This time he died winning," Bobby reassured him. He opened his bag and fished around inside for his emergency stash of morphine. "Right. Let's get you some medication before we make like the wind. This room… don't smell so good."

.

* * *

.

Bobby clutched the steering wheel of the Impala, glancing at Sam. The youngest and only surviving Winchester was staring out of the passenger window as if he expected it to leap over and bite him.

He didn't speak. Bobby didn't break the rumble of the classic either. Even the Impala herself made neither slight rattles nor squeaks as she had once done when her favourite driver had been alive. It was as if, without him to appreciate her noises, she considered it pointless.

The two men had said nothing to each other during the three-hour wait in the hospital. Even while gesturing for Bobby to sign for the treatment and the new plaster cast on his wrist, Sam had not been able to bring himself to utter a word.

Now, as night fell around them, Sam simply held his newly-plastered wrist to his chest, his head against the glass, listening to the rumble of the engine. He sighed quietly and Bobby glanced at him. The broken young man cleared his throat slightly, quietly, as if scared to interrupt the Impala's reassuring sound.

"I wanted to show him the iPod," Sam muttered. "I had a whole playlist on there just for him. I thought… you know, if I kept it on there, then he wasn't really gone." He paused, his voice weak. "That first time."

"Yeah," Bobby managed. _All day I wished to God you'd talk. Now I with you'd stop. But who the Hell am I to do that to you? My heart breaks for you, kid, it really does._

"It's got some of his favourites on it," Sam mused to himself in an innocent tone, and a tiny, shiny smile flitted over his face, touching his eyes for less than the time it took to register. "Bobby?"

"Yeah, son."

Sam's voice was young and guileless again, naiively asking why he and his brother didn't have a mother like other children: "Can you play it, please?"

Bobby swallowed a lump in his throat and put a hand out to the cassette player. He turned the knob and the light on the iPod attached to the cradle flickered into life.

"You'll have to work it, Sam."

He leaned forward with a sigh, sliding his thumb round the wheel and selecting. Finally he sat back, just as the opening _dongs_ of AC/DC's _Hell's Bells_ began to chime. He lifted his chin, tilting his head slightly to direct his voice toward the back of the car.

"We did it, Dean," he said, apparently to the load on the rear seat. "We killed Lilith. You, me and Bobby. Told you we needed all of us."

Then he settled into the seat, let his head lean against the glass, and began to hum along with the music.

Bobby looked up at the rear view mirror, eyeing the corpse covered in the brown blanket, taking up the entire rear seat. He swallowed, looked back at the road, and concentrated on only the song as if his life depended on it.

.

* * *

.

The Impala pulled up at the rather lonely roadside motel, Bobby glancing at the clock to find it already nearly midnight. He looked over at Sam, out for the count, his head against his jacket between the corner of the seat and the window. He thought for a long moment, then turned in the seat and got out of the car, making every effort not to look at the rear seat.

He crossed the car park and took himself into Reception, stopping by the desk. He rang the bell and a good two minutes went by unchecked, being careful not to disturb him as he refused to think about the day so far. At last an elderly man appeared and it took less than ten minutes to get a room with two beds paid for. Bobby mumbled a passable reply to the man's friendly remark about the weather before retreating to the familiarity of Dean's car.

_Sam's car, now. Again_. He huffed as he opened the driver's door, getting in and sitting heavily. He leaned over and nudged a dosing Sam. "Hey, come on, boy."

"Another minute, Dean," Sam muttered.

Bobby wet his lips, looking at the stereo for help. When it didn't immediately give him advice on what to do next, he looked back at Sam and shook his shoulder.

"If that don't work," yawned Dean, putting two forearms to the back of the front seat to lean on them as he rubbed his eye, "just stick your finger in his ear."

Bobby froze. He felt something moving behind him, knew something alive was in the car. He made himself turn in a painfully slow manoeuvre that would have put an elderly Tai Chi master to shame. He stared at the man now sitting up on the rear seat, leaning his weight on his arms, moving his hand from his eye to his nose, rubbing in complete obliviousness.

"Dean?" Bobby asked quietly.

"Hmm? You ok, Bobby, you look like--" Dean asked blearily, obviously drowsy. He let his hand drop. "My _God_, am I hungry!" he gasped suddenly. His right elbow left the seat and he put his hand to his stomach. "I feel like I haven't eaten in--. Oh. Hey! I'm hungry!" he grinned. "Holy crap! I'm alive! I'm actually alive!"

Bobby just stared. And stared.

Dean grinned back.

Bobby stared.

Dean's grin shrank to a smile.

Bobby stared.

Dean's smile turned worried.

Bobby stared.

Dean's worry morphed into dismay.

"What?" he dared, leaning back away from the seat, fearing the older Singer's next move.

But Bobby stretched a hand out and clapped it to the side of Dean's neck. The Winchester jumped at the harshness of the contact but then smiled in relief.

"It's me again. See? A pulse!" he nodded, Bobby's hand moving with him. Dean put a hand to his left wrist, squeezing. "I got a pulse again! I got a heartbeat! And - _man_ am I friggin' _hungry_."

"Yeah," Bobby whispered. "Oh, holy Hellfire and buckets of blood!" he crowed suddenly. "We thought you were dead, boy! Like, _really_ dead!"

Dean chuckled until Bobby removed his hand. "I don't know what happened, man - one minute I was feeling the most tired I've ever been in my life, the next I woke up on this seat. What'd I miss?"

Bobby put a hand out and punched Sam in the shoulder. Dean's face registered surprise until Sam shot upright, looking around.

"What? What is it?" he demanded, reaching for the glovebox.

"Whoa whoa whoa," Dean said quickly, rightly judging the Colt to be in there. "Calm down, Sammy. Just hold on a second."

Sam froze. Bobby put a hand on his shoulder. Sam appeared to steel himself before he looked round slowly. He looked at Dean. His brother grinned and tilted his head, his tongue sticking out slightly from beyond his teeth as he waggled his eyebrows.

Sam blinked. His entire face sagged. The eyebrows melted at the sides, spilling woe and heartbreak down the sides of his face with devastating effectiveness. His mouth opened. Then it closed.

"Huh? Huh?" Dean prompted as he grinned delightedly, lifting his hand and waving a finger at his face. "Captain friggin' Scarlet, I'm telling you. --Oooh, eyes," he added quickly, looking at Bobby. "How are my eyes?"

Bobby just shook his head, reaching back and grabbing Dean's shoulder. He squeezed and shook it heartily, making Dean's head wobble a little and Sam stop staring quite so piteously.

"Well they look normal to me," the older man grinned.

"So come on, where's the food? I could eat a whole cow if there was enough ketchup," Dean grinned, his mouth wider than the Amazon river during the wet season. "And I need my jacket. It's chilly back here," he added, pulling at the collar of his borrowed checked shirt.

"I think…" Bobby began. Then he gave up, and shook his head. His brain regrouped and he put a hand on a shoulder of each Winchester. "I think we need to get in that room and check everyone for brain fever."

"Good thinking, Batman," Dean nodded. "Sammy? Give me your phone. I have _got_ to call for pizza. Right. Now."

.

* * *

.

Outside the window, their invisible noses inches from the glass, stood two ordinary looking gentlemen. One was taller, wider, imposing in his stance and his appearance. His close-cropped midnight hair stole over his black velvet features as he watched the commotion inside the motel room.

His companion stood to one side, more fascinated than he over the antics of the three men inside the room. His windswept black hair was either fashionably styled to deliberately look like bedhair, or he had in fact been dragged through a hedge backwards some time in the very recent past. His dark accountant's suit and rumpled beige raincoat gave him a shabby appearance, to be sure, but his eager eyes sparkled in the light thrown from the motel room.

"He is restored," the man in the mac observed.

"Hmm. Back to just a mud-monkey." The taller, darker man considered for a long moment. "The original seal in intact. And she is dead; the other sixty-five seals can never be opened in order. Our work here is done."

"Should we not visit him? He must be told why he had to be dead to take on the power and face Lilith, why we gave his transferred power the option to grow as it did." He paused. "It was fortunate he chose to smite demons, therefore triggering his power to develop, and not give up or choose another target."

"It was not fortuitous. Our Father chose him for a reason. We did not know he needed the other two. Perhaps his capability, his worth, was… over-estimated."

"Our Father created families for a reason. Perhaps this was it. Perhaps his role was to bring the three of them together as a unit," he offered, his hands going into the pockets of his mac.

"Perhaps. If you recall, he failed to do this when we gave him back his father. Look what happened there."

The man in the raincoat considered for a long moment. "But everything he did led up to this moment. Perhaps what he did was not meant to come to fruition until now."

"Perhaps."

"It would be… agreeable to admit I led him back to his family after he found the exit from Hell. Do we visit him, explain to him? He must have questions."

"No. He must never know he was a servant of God."

"Why?"

"You question our orders?"

"I seek… clarity."

"He must never know we angels exist. He must never know we enabled him to carry out the Lord's work - using our power to do it."

"Because he is mortal again?"

"Because those are our orders."

Silence.

"So this is over?" the man in the raincoat dared.

The two of them stared in through the window, watching the two younger men hug for a moment, one of them patting at his brother's back with a white cast on his wrist. The older man broke them up with a slice of pizza aimed straight at the mouth of the short-haired man, and a lot of laughter ensued as he attempted to ram the entire slice in his mouth at once. Dark brown glass bottles were raised, words were said, beer was drunk.

"It is indeed over," said the larger man. "All things have been settled here today. We will rejoin the garrison. To tell them we have been victorious."

The man in the raincoat acknowledged his colleague leaving. He stepped back to go, to return to his garrison of angels.

But something made him pause. He drew closer to the window once again, his nose barely millimetres from the divide, safe in the knowledge that the obviously celebrating humans could not see or perceive him. His head tilted as he let himself be drawn into their raucous laughter, their loud opening of more beer bottles, their good-natured argument over who rightfully owned the last surviving piece of pizza.

_Is this what it is to have human family?_ the angel asked himself, at once awed and intrigued.

As he watched, transfixed, the sandy-haired angels' champion - who had secured the remaining piece of pizza and was now crowing about it as if he had won an Olympic medal - happened to swing away from the tallest man in the room, as if to protect his prize. In doing so he looked out of the window. For a heartbeat - barely that - it was as if the angel and the human shared a look.

But that could not be. It was not possible that a human could perceive an angel's countenance while on invisible reconnaissance. It was not possible that the human who had been used, abused and restored by Heaven could have known the angel was standing outside the window, wanting to be on the inside.

The man smiled in a way that told the angel they two were the only ones in existence who understood.

The angel took a step back. He continued to stare, but the man was now teasing the others and arguing with them over the beer bottles in the corner of the room, as if the sliver of a moment had never happened.

The being in the raincoat, angel of the Lord and very recent convert as far as believing in the human power of families went, permitted himself a small smile.

He turned with a swish of his long beige mac, and walked away.

**FIN**

**.**

**.**

_I know the end with Dean coming back may seem like a cop-out, but I've been totally stove-piped by fandom deaths in 2009. We lost Pamela [other SPN season 5 names censored for spoiler reasons], and across the divide there was Ka D'Argo and Jool, and, devastatingly, Ianto Jones. Crowning Moment of Grief and Despair: the end of Doctor Ten (alright, technically that was 1st January, 2010). I was all set to leave Dean at rest until I realised that I just refused to lose any more characters - from any fandom._

_It's always the good who die because of someone else's problems. Well tonight, ladies and gents, I hope I redressed the balance just a little._

**Thanks for reading!**


End file.
